Fields of Grey
by Ayezur
Summary: A jug of wine, a loaf of bread, and thou beside me singing in the wilderness.  Some paths are easier tread together than alone.  VinxTi.
1. Chapter One

**Disclaimer: Only thing I own is the cat. Poor overworked kitty. It should complain to the Symbolic Things Union.**

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_When I was younger I saw things in black and white  
Now all I see is sad, hazy grey  
Sometimes I see a narrow flash of light  
Sometimes I look and you show me the way_

"Fields of Grey," Bruce Hornsby

The cat had taken to hiding inside as the nights grew chill, following him down into the warmer cellars and caves hollowed from the mountain like a honeycomb infection rotting it from within. Sometimes he fancied he could blow the whole thing down with a single shouted word, and his silences grew deeper as the cold drew closer. The cat liked to sleep next to him, curled up inside his larger circle of tangled limbs and tight-strapped leather. There were no beds, and the coffin was out of the question. He would not go back there, not until his last bits of _self_ had fallen off and he could safely pull the lid on and sleep the years away, crumbling into dust without fear of waking.

The evenings were still warm, however, when the sun had come out from behind the mountains and angled light through overgrown gardens. The cat liked to go out then, and he would follow for lack of anything better to do. That was the only reason he saw her when she pulled up to the gate of the mansion, and it had been so long he nearly fled.

She had seen him, and was climbing towards the path carrying whatever tools she thought she needed this time as though nothing had changed – as though it hadn't been three months (not that he was counting or anything) and his heart wasn't inexplicably splitting at the sight of her.

"Hello, Vincent," she said, sitting in the half-dead grass next to him and he realized he'd lost time again, easy as blinking. These moments of suspended animation were happening more and more frequently now; a new infection in an old wound. Before it had only been his _mind_ he was in danger of losing, not that the fractured remnants of his wits had done him much good in the years since his awakening.

She had been speaking. He blinked and looked up, a question in his eyes. She sighed.

"I said, I'm sorry for missing so many visits. There was a problem… nothing major, just Cloud being, you know, Cloud. And then Marlene got sick, and there was some sort of insurance problem with the bar…"

He ducked his head forward and let his eyes close. Her voice washed over him, color and light, rising and falling in gentle waves, not the quick, animated spikes that had driven him from civilization. It was easy to focus on her. She drove the chill away.

"…anyway, hopefully this'll make it up to you." He looked up again, asking another silent question, and she stared at him.

"It's your _birthday_, Vincent, remember? I made us a meal to share. I would have taken you back to Edge with me but I remembered you hate crowds."

A jolt of world-tilting panic smothered itself and became a single shake of his head.

"Well, then, this is a nice spot and it should be warm for a few hours more…" she turned to the basket she had brought with her and opened it, swearing under her breath – something foul, no doubt picked up from Highwind – when she saw she had forgotten a cloth. His fingers moved faster than his mind, taking off his cloak and offering it as a replacement before he could reasonably withdraw. She looked startled (_please don't ask_ his face screamed without his knowledge) and took it, spreading it on the ground.

"Thank you, Vincent. Oh!" she said, pulling out a piece of thick paper with the covered dishes. "Marlene drew this. She misses you, you know – she knows I see you, and keeps asking when Uncle Vincent is going to come and visit."

He made no move to take it from her and she lay it on the grass beside him, where he gazed at it the same way someone might look at a particularly perplexing bit of tax form. It was a child's drawing, perspective skewed and colors scribbled every which way, but it was very clearly _him_, seen through a little girl's eyes. He was standing with what looked to be Tifa lying on the ground beside him (a torrent of blood coming from her head showed that the child was at least appropriately morbid for her age), his clawed hand – almost twice as big as he was – reaching out and tearing alongside a monster depicted as a shapeless mass of fangs and scales. Droplets of blood spurted from the wound, and the beast had little x-ed out eyes. _Uncle Vincent saving Aunt Tifa from a monster_ was scrawled across the top in a neat, childish hand.

"Yuffie told her about that time… remember? In the forest, when I'd gone off and you came after me? I think that's what inspired that little masterpiece."

She turned her head away quickly, cheeks tinted red, and finished setting his cloak. He moved automatically, something like hunger stirring for the first time in years, and his mind wandered back to… how long ago was it now? Almost four years...

_"Tifa's missing!" A frenetic ball of black hair and blades assaulted him as soon as he stepped from the dark forest into the little circle cast by their campfire. "She had some kind of _fight,_ her and Cloud, and she_ left_ and now we don't know where she _is_ and they're all looking for her and made me an' Red stay here in case she comes back and you gotta help, Vinnie, you gotta!"_

_He had backed away almost immediately, raising his hands to ward her off and nodding as he retreated back into the forest. Circling the campfire once told him which directions the others had set off in; a second and third circle brought him to her trail. She had muddled it nicely, criss-crossing and doubling back and going in wide circles, but Hojo had done more to his body then merely rearrange it for the convenience of the creatures in his bones. He could smell her scent on the wind, citrus and spice, and followed it until he could sense her radiant heat and hear the racing of her heart._

_She screamed, and he began to run._

_He found her in time to watch her fall. She didn't make sound, only sighed a little as her eyes rolled back in her head and something strained and __snapped__ in his chest. He launched himself at the creature that had felled her – he couldn't quite see what it was, but it was no match for Death Penalty, and when it lunged at him, wounded and baying, he jammed the long claws of his twisted hand into its eyes and past them, destroying what brain it had._

_All this he remembered later; when he came to himself again, he was crouched over her, cradling her body to his chest and sobbing like a child, lips pressed against her hair and tasting the salted copper blood trickling down her cheek. _

…the others had never seen that. They had only seen him carrying her back into the circle of firelight and rushed around her, taking her away and healing her, and heard the story later. And he had never told anyone of that moment after the battle, when he had thought for an instant she was dead or so near as to make no difference.

He had forgotten it himself.

"Why did you leave?" The words fell from his mouth unbidden, a heavy anchor dropped in the pleasant froth of her self-sustaining chatter. She cocked her head at him, confused, and put down the remnants of the meal.

"Three years ago… in the forest. Why did you leave?" It was hard to dredge up the words to say what he needed to say from the grey maelstrom his mind had become. He was losing himself – skipping time and forgetting words and he knew without knowing that the only things holding him here were the promise of her visits and a small white cat. They would fade, though, eventually, and he could sleep again. Everything would fade, so there was no point in mustering the strength to understand why she kept him hooked into the world with all its bright cruelty.

She had fallen silent; for once he hadn't missed what she'd said while he wandered in his own mind. The day had grown dark and chill, and she shivered. He noticed – not for the first time – the elegant curve of her arms as she wrapped them around her knees, the graceful bend of her neck and the dark hair draped over her skin.

"Cloud and I…" she said finally, resting her chin on the top of her knees. "We… argued. It was stupid. It was about Aeris… well, about me. He accused me of trying to replace her."

Replace her…? Aeris was Aeris, and Tifa was Tifa. The Cetra had been… frail, somehow, translucent against the brightness of the world, while Tifa was solidity and strength, warm persistence sparking against the harder edges of existence.

"…foolish…" he said, nearly a breath.

"Wasn't it, though?" She wiped idly at her eyes. "Why would I even try? I couldn't have compared with her, I just wanted to make sure he was alright…"

He tilted his head slightly, watching as the cat left off harrying a field mouse and came to stretch between them. There was something backwards about what she had said, something very wrong, and he couldn't work through the words to find her meaning.

She began to pet the cat idly, long fingers stroking white fur to the animal's obvious delight. "Honestly, Vincent, do you ever pet her?"

"I pet her," he said, mildly indignant.

"Obviously not enough," she laughed shakily when the cat climbed into her lap. "Poor kitty, I left you with the grouchiest, most antisocial man on the planet, didn't I?" The cat settled happily, purring and kneading her thighs through her jeans, and she scratched at its ears.

"Did you ever name her?"

"Tifa," he said. She waited expectantly for a beat, then flushed and looked away. It was a half-truth – he never called the cat, so it didn't know it had a name (except for whatever name it gave itself), but in his mind… it was her, in a way, the promise that she would come back, something he hadn't thought he needed until she had stopped coming.

"You know, it's funny," she said idly, letting the cat bat at her fingers. "Cats have a terrible reputation for being aloof and snooty, but they're really very affectionate and loving. They're just picky. They won't cuddle up to just anyone, and you have to treat them properly."

He eyed her suspiciously, hiding under his bangs. "…I am not a cat, Tifa."

"Are you sure?" There was that brilliant grin again, piercing him and focusing him on _her_, and before he could react she had shifted to kneel closer to him – the cat deposited on the ground with an indignant squeak – and was running her fingers through his hair. "You could be hiding anything under that mess, even a pair of cat ears."

Lightning shot down his spine. She had touched him before, through layers of black leather, but never directly, never skin-to-skin. He closed his eyes, wrestling with some darker part of himself that wanted to do… something… something impossible, something he could never force on her, and inhaled sharply and leaned into her touch regardless. She pulled away, startled and perhaps aware she had crossed a line. He let out one shuddering breath and opened his eyes.

"There's something I want to show you," he said, the words he had been searching for thick and dry in his mouth.

* * *

She had the grace not to speak while he led her through the maze of stone, trusting his footsteps to take him where he wanted to go. She had startled once at the skittering of a cave-creature and grasped his hand. He let it stay there, bending his fingers just barely enough to brush the skin on the back of her hand. There was no light this far down; needing none, he hadn't thought to bring any and he felt her drawing closer to him as the darkness pressed down further. 

"It's not far now," he said, pausing at a fork in the path. He felt more than heard her nod, and led her farther down.

Eventually the corridor opened into a wide cavern lit with a dim phosphorescent glow. Thin columns of stone caught what little light there was and sent it spinning; huge stone curtains draped themselves along the walls and drifted into a shallow glassy lake. The floor was scalloped with fossilized waves and thin fronds hung from the ceiling, frozen claws growing by millimeters a century.

She gasped and walked forward, letting her hand slide from his. He watched as she roamed around the cavern, sliding in and out of the thin forest of stone and draping a hand in the cold lakewater. She brought her wet hand to her mouth and tasted it; he knew the taste would be heavy and mineral on her tongue, almost dark and just a little bitter. Her skin glowed in the light, and when she turned to face him her pupils were wide and black, devouring her eyes.

"Vincent…" she said, then let the weight of the mountain smother her words. He stepped forward, too close, and his hands twitched and convulsed at his sides. Something writhed under the calm grey swirl in his mind, tugging and snarling at its bonds, and he saw –

_he grabbed her tight around the waist, yanked her forward and crushed her against him, drank deep and pulled her down, stones pushing against his back and alive with stolen warmth_

– he had stepped forward again, and her eyes widened. The tight band around his chest loosened; he rested the fingertips of his human hand on her shoulder, tucking his claw behind his back while his mind sang her name like a psalm.

It was easy then, terribly easy, to throw a sop to the writhing need and press his lips delicately against hers. Electricity surged through him and the writhing dark shouted triumph before he broke, stumbling away to press against the reassuring solid stone.

"I… I'm sorry."

"For what?" She pressed her fingers to her lips, wondering and heavy with the weight of what his actions implied.

"You must leave now. It isn't…"

"What, Vincent?"

"…monstrous…" he choked out, and let himself sink to the ground. For a blessed moment he thought she hadn't understood, that he had offended her, finally, made her leave, and then she came to kneel before him.

"You aren't a monster." And her tone made him look up, meet her dilated eyes and see the fire raging in the black. It was a flat and angry statement, devoid of pleading or pity. "I've met monsters, Vincent Valentine. One came to my home and destroyed it, and my family, and my life. Another took away the person I loved most and with him, my dreams for a future. Monsters ruled Midgar's slums… you're not a monster. And I should know. I've spent my life fighting them."

She smoothed his hair back from his forehead and he grabbed her wrist, meeting her eyes.

"_Why?_" he rasped.

"Who else will?" she said, and now there was an edge of bitter steel. "Yuffie? Cloud? Cid? _You?_ No one else can hold us together."

"…there's no point," he murmured, dropping her wrist. A second later he flinched as she slammed a fist into the wall next to his head.

"_Then tell me to stop!_ Tell me life would be better – they would be _happier_ if I just let them go, let them wander off and live their lives and moved on with my own. Tell me you want me to stop, and I will. Tell me that's what you need, that you never wanted any of this, and I'll leave."

He had frozen under the wave of her resentment, fingers clutching the ridged rock beneath them.

"Do you think I didn't have dreams, Vincent? Do you think it's easy, always shouldering their burdens – no, Cloud, of course you're not to blame. Of course I still love you. Of course you're not a bad father, Barret, even though you're never around. Of course your dream is worth leaving Shera in the dust, Cid. Of course you're capable of ruling Wutai, Yuffie. We can do anything, right guys? Let's do our _best_." She spat out the phrase like poison, shaking, her fist still embedded in the stone. "And I'm selfish, dammit, because I won't let them go. I already lost everything once, and now this is all I have, I can't lose anyone else…"

She had kept her eyes on his as she spoke, and now he saw them well with tears, watched them overflow and trickle down her chin and she made no move to brush them away.

"… I won't let any of you go. You're all I have, and if I don't hold on… you won't hold on if I don't, and I can't lose anyone else. I can't…" Her voice broke and she bowed her head.

Leather scraped against stone as he shifted to his knees. He had left his cloak in the field, worlds away, where it was likely even now being mauled by the cat. Without a mask of cloth to hide behind he found himself staring at the hand and claw draped limply in his lap and hating himself. He couldn't find words; he tore at the cobwebs covering his mind, grasping desperately while the terrible darkness screamed at him to _show_ her, to take her in his arms and cover her, drown in the reality of her.

He moved suddenly, leather creaking as he imagined his bones did, and wrapped his arms around her. She was too lost in her tears by now to struggle or care, so it was easy to draw her close, twine his fingers in her hair and settle his metal arm across her body.

"That you care for me, Tifa Lockhart…" he said, swallowing to clear his throat from dust and clinging to the clarity her warmth brought. "…is an honor. One that I hope, one day, I will deserve."

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They walked back through the winding stone in silence, her breathing hitched and stuttering. She clung to his hand, fingers laced with his, and he knew without being able to say quite why that her head was bowed. The cat was waiting for them at the entrance to the cellar and wrapped herself around their legs, purring. 

"I… I should probably go," she said, refusing to look at him. "It's getting late. Marlene and Denzel will worry."

He looked at her closely then, ducking his head to meet her eyes and looking so much like a curious bird in the process that a smile ghosted across her lips – a pale shadow of her usual brilliant grin. He saw dark smudges under her eyes; saw how her skin stretched pale and thin across her cheeks, and the deep lines marring her forehead.

The cat collapsed in the dust next to them and stretched, irritated at the lack of attention.

"Tifa…" he said, more breath than voice.

She looked up and he found himself trapped in her eyes, immobilized by the weariness in them. "Yes, Vincent?"

"Do you… need some help around the bar?"

"Well, yes, always, I… why?"

"I've… been thinking. It might be time… there's nothing left for me here, is there?"

He broke away, finally, stooping to pick up the cat. She nestled against his chest and began to purr, and he risked a glance. Tifa was looking at him as though she'd never seen him before.

"No…" she said, finally, hesitantly. "There really isn't, is there? Just ghosts."

"And it's no place at all for a growing cat. Unless it's an imposition…"

"No, never," she said hurriedly, shaking her head. "We have the spare room, after all, and I'm sure I can find work for you." She paused for a second, then tilted her head. "Do you…?"

"No," he said to her unspoken question. He didn't need anything and so owned nothing. The cat did her business in the grounds, ate from the bags of dry food he braved the town to secure and drank from a clean stream that ran through the caves. Nothing material had ever held him to the mansion.

"I guess we should go, then," she said, fiddling with a strand of her hair. She walked down the path, towards the truck; he followed, lingering near the edge of the driveway while she gathered up the remains of their meal. She found his cloak under a bush, where the cat had dragged it; it had become even more bedraggled, covered in grass stains and shredded by kneading claws, so he shook his head at her and she left it where it was.

A breeze slid quietly through the grounds as the old truck sputtered away, rattling gravel. It caressed the dangling shutters and waved through the trees, rippling the grass and fluttering a scarlet cape lying on the ground.


	2. Chapter Two

**A/N: Once more unto the breach, dear friends. Etc. Why do I post these things no one reads? It is a mysterious mystery of mysteriousness.**

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_I don't know if I can take it,  
I'm not easy on my knees  
Here's my heart, I'll let you break it…_

- "Love and Peace or Else," U2

"Well… here we are," she said, pulling into the driveway of Seventh Heaven. A glance beside her showed that Vincent was still staring out the passenger side window, keeping one hand on his cat – _Tifa,__ I can't believe he named her Tifa_ – to keep her from getting loose. She'd been well behaved during the ride, though, only letting out a single plaintive meow as they left Nibelheim.

She got out of the truck and walked to the side entrance, feeling him behind her as she fumbled with her keys (the locksmith had cut them a little roughly and it always took ages to get in, just one more of the little things she wanted to fix and never found the time for). He was so damn _noticeable_, that was the problem. She had always been able to sense him, niggling in the back of her mind, fleeting glimpses in the corner of her eye. It had repulsed her at first, terrified her until she came to know him and understood _why_, exactly, her instincts kept labeling him a threat.

"Marlene's going to be really happy to see you." Her nerves sang along her bones as she finally managed to open the door, standing back. He glanced at her for a second, then slid through. "Denzel's never met you, but I'm sure he'll be fine, he's heard of you, of course."

She was babbling again, covering her thoughts with words that said little and meant less. It was hard to say when she'd picked up the habit; she knew she hadn't been that way in Nibelheim. Once it burned, though, she'd had to learn how to deflect attention, how to fade into the background and cover her grief and rage with a smile. AVALANCHE had been so small and filled with directionless rage when she'd found it… they'd needed a center, a headquarters and a smiling face. She'd needed people to care for. It was a fair trade.

And really, she'd rather be smiling and hopeful than what she could feel under the surface of her mind in the darker hours of the night.

"Tifa…?" Denzel came downstairs, clutching the banister with one hand and brushing sleep from his eyes with the other. He saw Vincent and stopped short. "Who's that?"

"This is Vincent, Denzel," Tifa said, putting a hand on the gunman's shoulder. "He was a member of AVALANCHE. You remember."

"What's he doing _here?_" A certain strain of suspicion laced the boy's – no, he was fourteen now, she had to remember – the young _man's_ voice. He had moved into his own room just last month, clearing out Cloud's old storeroom… it was never used anymore, after all.

"He's come to stay for a while, and help me run the bar." She went over to Denzel and out of the corner of her eye noticed that both men had frozen where they were, eyes locked on each other. "Go on back to bed, honey, okay?"

"…alright." He broke eye contact reluctantly and trudged back up the stairs, vanishing. She turned back to Vincent, who was closing the door with the cat still clutched to his chest. Even without the cloak he slumped, holding himself inward and hidden.

"You can probably put her down now."

He didn't, and she shrugged mentally. "C'mon, let me show you your room."

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It was the very last door in the upstairs hallway, just across from and a little to the right of hers. There was a bed against the far right corner and a dresser across from it, with a window between. A small writing desk was next to the bed, in the near right corner, and there was a tiny closet the inwards-opening door concealed. 

"It's not very big," she said, lacing her hands tightly to keep from fluttering. "The bathroom's right next door, you'll have to share with Denzel and Marlene. Sorry."

He nodded, and the corner of his mouth tilted in what might have been a smile. The cat, tired of being carted around, finally sank her claws into the leather covering his arms and he let her go. She darted under the bed and hunched there, growling, and he looked blankly at Tifa.

"It's her first night in a new place, with new smells and city sounds and people she doesn't know. Of course she's scared," she chided him gently. "We'll go out tomorrow and get her a catbox and all that. Oh, and she'll need tags, and to be spayed, and vaccinated, and we should get you some clothing…"

He took a half-step backwards, red eyes wide, and she smiled at him. "Don't worry so much, Vincent! You can sit in the car and mope if you want. Of course, I might buy you bright pink shirts and fuchsia slacks…"

He glared at her. She loved teasing him; he almost seemed normal in those brief moments, not some distant statue but a man and entirely too human.

_She saw his hands twitch at his sides, saw his eyes widen and his tongue dart out to lick his lips and she __knew__, then, knew what was coming and did nothing to stop him as he pulled her close and pressed his mouth to hers, did nothing but urge him silently, guiltily onwards…_

Her smile faltered and she turned away, feeling something shift between them. If she looked back she knew she would see him slumped in the middle of the room, his room, following her with those lost, broken eyes. Like a wounded animal…

It would be easy to walk away. Something stirred in her and told her it was best to stop now, before it went too far. He would leave sooner or later if she just _didn't_.

But she did, turning without thinking and covering the few feet between them to wrap her arms around him. His heartbeat pounded through his skin and she rested her head briefly on his chest.

"I'm glad you're here, Vincent."

The claws of his metal hand twitched and turned just a bit, almost resting on her hip, and his human hand pressed lightly against the small of her back.

"…I am, too," he whispered, and let go. Tifa smiled at him over her shoulder before she closed the door.

She looked in on the children before she went to bed, closing Marlene's window against the night's cold air and gently tucking Denzel's arm back on the bed. He slept like Cloud had, sprawled across the bed as though he feared it would float away without his weight to hold it down. Marlene, on the other hand, curled up like a new fern in a mound of pillows and tangled blankets. She could only wonder how Vincent slept, _if_ he slept; she had never seen him tuck away for a night's rest. He'd always taken first watch, Barret staying up and eyeing him from across the campfire. By the time she rose for the third watch he would be gone, and Barret would be snoring like a thunderstorm between Yuffie and Nanaki, who invariably had his head under a pillow. She couldn't blame him; Yuffie was as enthusiastic a sleeper as Barret, her only saving grace being a tendency to muffle herself by sleeping facedown. Only sheer exhaustion could really explain how anyone had gotten a night's sleep, back in the day.

Exhaustion had been her constant companion during those few, wild months. A heavy, bone-deep fatigue so inescapable it was all she could do to keep going, never mind smile and support and encourage and be strong… but she'd found a way, somehow. She always would; she had to.

Tifa pulled the covers over herself and tried to settle in, unable to close eyes wide with sleepless nights. And now she had taken on another stray – well, two more, if you counted Vincent. Why he had asked to come, after her outburst in the cave… well, it was a mystery, wasn't it? He was a mystery. Or perhaps it wasn't such a mystery; he simply needed looking after.

– _cold chapped lips pressed delicately against hers fingertips pressed soft and hesitant against her shoulder and she was so warm in the darkness of the cave his fingers in her hair and his heart roaring – _

_Don't think about it_, she told herself firmly. Don't think about all that needs doing, and everything that's yet to be done. Don't think about two years ago, or four years ago, and how every time you think it's over and you can live again something goes wrong…

Her eyes closed.

_The tree is heavy with fruit branches bowed to the bright green grass while clouds drift lazily by in a sky too blue to be real it's a perfect summer day the kind that only exists in storybooks and memories and she wonders why he isn't climbing. _

_He's a pool of crimson in the shadow of the tree telling her that he can't, it's too far to reach. _

_I'll help you __up,__ she says kneeling and cupping her hands to give him a boost. _

_No, he says and lifts her to the first branch_

_She perches there and searches for the brightest ripest apple, finding it so near the top she almost falls and brings it down to hand to him he touches it and then they're sitting on the branch together gorging themselves on the sweetness of the fruit and the clean summer air._


	3. Chapter Three

**Not like any of you non-reviewing people deserve it, but you get two chapters this update. Woot**

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_Well, some say life will beat you down  
Break your heart, and steal your crown  
Seems I've started out for god-knows-where  
Guess I'll know when I get there._

"Learning To Fly," Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers

He woke without realizing he had slept, a dim remembered dream behind his eyelids and the sweetness of apples fading on his tongue. At first he simply lay where he was, overwhelmed. Waking in Seventh Heaven hadn't disoriented him, he had known that would happen; but now there was the question of _what next_ and the simple task of standing and greeting the day seemed impossibly daunting.

He sat up. That seemed like a good first step. The bed was soft and yielding under him, the sheets crisp and smelling of something sweetly cloying and artificial. The memory of scented laundry soap surfaced and he reached behind him to bring one of the pillows up to his face. Chamomile, maybe, or honey?

The door creaked open and he grabbed for the gun at the bedside table, relaxing when the cat slipped through. It proceeded to drop on its side and twist on the floor, scratching an itch, before rolling back onto its legs and jumping up on the desk.

Someone knocked tentatively on the door, and he heard Tifa call his name.

"…come in."

"Morning," she said, opening the door. "Well, almost afternoon. I thought it was better to let you sleep, but it's nearly noon and we have a lot to do."

"…noon?"

She nodded. "You slept really late. Are you hungry?"

He began to shake his head when his stomach interrupted; he blinked, startled, and Tifa hid a smile. "I still have some batter in the fridge from this morning. How do pancakes sound?"

When he had been a child, he had seen a demonstration by Shinra scientists of the many ways their technology could – would – change the world for the better. Fancy, flashy things, miracles at the flip of a switch; he knew now at what cost, but at the time, looking at the stage in awe, he had seen only wonder and known he would be a part of it, one day. He'd drunk in every sight and every sound, imprinting it on his memory to tell others, someday, that _here_ was where it had begun.

He nodded and got out of bed.

* * *

The batter sizzled softly; bacon crackled and popped in the neighboring pan. Dishes rang gently against each other when they were taken from shelves and clattered lightly on the counter. The toaster hummed, the coffeemaker gurgled, juice swished quietly on its journey from fridge to glass and back again. Her feet thumped lightly against the floor; she shut the cabinets a little harder than was necessary, wood smacking wood. Cars growled outside, a dog barked incessantly in the distance, and he had to close his eyes. 

He had thought she would say no. It had been clear in his mind, how Tifa would give him a sad little half-smile (knowing, now, what he was and what could never be) and walk away and never come back. Then the seasons would meld into each other, decaying and blurring until finally there was nothing left but to lock the door behind him and throw away the key. A quiet ending to a worthless life.

Any other man would not have stepped back and simply let things happen, not when she'd been so frail and half-seduced by mad visions of mothering a new, better kind of human.

He'd known it would end badly, hadn't he? He'd wanted her happiness, but he'd also wanted her to go so deep she'd need him to ride to the rescue. So damn foolish… Tifa had no way of knowing the true depths of his sin, and he could never find the words to tell her. He had expected her to turn away because he had lost control there, in the dark, and obeyed the writhing black murk. It still spoke of taking her, roughly, gently, soothing over old scars and drinking her tears until she never wept again.

She hadn't turned away, had she? It was almost enough to make him hope.

"…I already dealt with the cat, almost, the vet can't see her until next week." Tifa was speaking and he tried to focus on her, cutting through the noise that threatened to grab his mind and send it spinning again. The mansion had been silent and gentle, like a warm blanket on a cold night. "Denzel and Marlene are at school; Marlene takes the bus and Denzel walks home, so I don't have to pick them up. They both have keys but I'd still like to be home when school gets out, so we only really have a few hours. That should be enough to pick up some basics, I'm sure, and the bar doesn't open until late, so once they're settled we can always go out again."

"What did you want me to do?" he asked, and by her puzzled expression deduced that he hadn't made sense. He was still trying to work it out when her face cleared and she turned to the stove to flip over the pancakes.

"You know, I hadn't really thought about it. Let me see… I can tend bar myself, and my regulars wouldn't want a change anyway. Opening is fairly easy, but I'm always exhausted by closing time…" She was thinking out loud again and he slipped away into the thin fog while her voice rose and fell around him.

"I can do that," he heard himself say, and had to frantically skim over her last words to find what prompted it. Something about not having a head for numbers…

"You were a bookkeeper?" she asked, incredulous, and saved him the trouble of piecing it together.

"…no. But I was a Turk." She blinked at him again, and he fumbled for words. "In my day… we were more than bullies. Anything that needed doing, we were… expected to do, or know someone who could." Exhausted by the effort of dragging up the relevant concepts and stringing them into something coherent, he lapsed into silence as she dished up breakfast. Well, lunch.

_They were staring at him out of the corner of their eyes, talking guardedly of innocuous things. He kept his eyes on the fire, content to linger on the outskirts of the light. They had the right to be wary; there was no way they could know how he burned and saw the monster's face every time he closed his eyes. Heard his laugh in his nightmares… his arm ached in remembered pain and he pressed flesh against metal, closing his eyes._

_"Are you hungry?" _

_He snapped back to attention and saw one of the women – the warrior – had come over with a tin. She stepped back and her heartbeat accelerated; fear dilated her pupils and flooded the air around her with adrenal musk. He broke eye contact and bent his head, staring at the grass between his feet._

_She knelt near him and he could see her holding the tin out to him in the corner of his eye. _

_"It's not much," she said. Her voice only trembled a little. "But you should probably eat something. I mean, it must have been a while since…"_

_He waited for her to leave._

_"…alright." She put the tin down near him and stood, heading back to the campfire. He risked a glance up, and the huge dark man with the gun-arm was glaring at him._

_"Told you not to bother, Tifa," he rumbled. "Man's probably half-crazed."_

_"He can _hear_ you, __Barret__," she retorted. "And anyone would be a little confused, after what he's been through."_

_She looked over his way for a second and met his eyes. He stared at her, and she didn't look away; her eyes were a deep, warm brown. Reflexively, he tucked his metal arm behind his back and broke eye contact, reaching with his human hand for the tin she had left. _

"…you're awfully quiet. I mean, more than usual."

Vincent looked up, wrenched into the present, and realized he had almost finished eating. He was still slipping through time without noticing.

"I'm sorry," he said, pushing the plate away. "I… thank you. It was very good." That was what you were supposed to say. "I should…" he reached for the word and found it drifting easily to hand "…shower now."

"Oh. Sure. Um, you can use what's already in there; we'll buy more soap and stuff today."

Standing, he took his plates over the counter and put them near the sink, obscurely proud of himself for remembering some of the niceties of civilization.

* * *

The mirror in the bathroom was very small. He still draped a towel over it, and wondered what to do next. The easiest option was to leave the water running for a while and stick his head under it for verisimilitude; then it occurred to him, horribly, that he hadn't showered since he'd woken up in the cellar. He hadn't thought to, and none of the usual discomforts had manifested themselves. 

Maybe he didn't need to anymore. He had no way of knowing what Hojo had done to him; removing his ability to sweat seemed an odd and unnecessary change. Then again, so was butchering and rearranging his body to accommodate monsters. Though that begged the question of how he had been kept from overheating.

Had he even undressed in all that time? There was a disturbing thought, but he might have been just that lost.

Flesh caressed metal; the mechanisms whirred under his fingers as he felt for the release switch. He had discovered how to take it off shortly after joining AVALANCHE; he rarely did, as the arm underneath the machine looked more like a corpses' shriveled claw than anything human. The gauntlet had been designed to intercept the nervous signals to his arm, a cool voice murmured in the back of his mind. Unfortunately, the muscles in the arm had to be artificially atrophied in order to fit the gauntlet over it, and there was no chance of recovery. Allowing him to keep the dead arm had served no purpose other than to remind him that he had once been whole, which was exactly why he had been forced to keep it. Hojo had been sure to tell him that the gauntlet was designed to work in conjunction with the remains of his arm. Cut it off, and he would have only the one.

He released the catch and slid it off, focusing on the gleam of the metal as the atrophied limb slithered out. Though the skin had no sensation left, he shuddered as it thumped dead and cold against his side and lay the gauntlet across the sink.

Undoing his belts and shirt buttons was awkward with only one hand, but the gauntlet would have torn his clothing and he didn't have replacements handy. He could see an angry Y-shaped scar running down his torso and resisted the urge to uncover the mirror and get a better look.

Pants next. Without the belts they already sat low on his hips, and he slid them down and stepped out. His boots came off easily enough, the metal tips clattering against the floor; he glanced at his feet and would have gasped, but there was suddenly no air in his lungs.

Thin, flexible wires ran where the tendons should be, breaking through to lie close to the skin near the arc of each foot and rejoining as a group a little ways up his shin. He could see them running just under the skin, wrapping around his legs like unnatural scars and vanishing somewhere around his hips. Long seams ran down the outer side of each leg, puffy and red, and he remembered waking from the anesthesia and looking down to find nothing but wet red where his legs should be…

The wave of remembered pain and nausea left him staggering and choking back bile, holding onto the sink for fear of falling. His dead arm wagged uselessly and he stifled back the howling urge to rip the rotting thing off and run, get away from this house and this city and _her_ with her softness and gentle voice and the hope she couldn't help carrying like a banner...

He stayed where he was, breathing, and thought of Tifa's eyes.

The moment passed; he straightened and got in the shower.


	4. Chapter Four

_Lord, I kneel and offer you my word on a wing  
And I'm trying hard to fit among your scheme of things  
It's safer than a strange land, but I still care for myself  
And if I don't stand in my own light…_

"Word on a Wing," Davie Bowie

Edge had grown over the past four years: what had begun as a hesitant little town clinging to Midgar's rotten bulk had become a worthy heir to the old gotham. The metropolis had sprawled outwards rather than cannibalize itself as its predecessor had, surrounding and engulfing the outskirts of the ruins as Reeve's World Regenesis Organization slowly purified each acre.

As the city grew, people had moved their homes away from Midgar's remains, abandoning the buildings to business and entertainment. Tifa's Seventh Heaven straddled what was currently the borderline between the residential and commercial districts; outward expansion had begun to slow in favor of engulfing what was left of Midgar, and the lines hadn't seen any real change in the past year. Edge had been small and vulnerable before, reeling in the aftermath of Meteor and then the geostigma. Now it bustled, settling into the land like a contented brood hen.

Vincent stayed very close to her as they wandered through the tight, winding streets, acting as though he was afraid to let her out of his sight. It wasn't invasive so much as it was… odd, and unlike what she knew of him. He _had_ begun to open up towards the end of the mission, but after the geostigma began he had withdrawn again, and she hadn't seen him again until the fight against Bahamut SIN, where he had been as odd and distant as ever. And he'd more or less hidden from her after she'd begun to visit him in Nibelheim…

She heard metal clicking rapidly against concrete behind her and turned. He was hurrying to catch up; lost in thought, she had sped up without noticing his sudden interest in a cell phone display.

"Did you ever get a phone?"

"…no," he said, ducking his head slightly. His hair covered his eyes and the angle made it difficult to read his face; she thought she saw his hand twitch, briefly, and his throat work as he swallowed.

"Are you alright?"

"I… nothing's wrong. It… how much farther?"

"Just a couple of blocks," she said, gesturing ahead. The streets were crowded at this time of day, all the stay-at-home mothers out doing their daily shopping and gossiping. Shopkeepers hollered their deals at top volume, each one trying to outdo the last; a few businesspeople could be seen finishing their lunches in outdoor cafes or walking in suited clumps towards their buildings. The scents of a dozen different stores (oiled leather here, spice over there, fish over there) swirled and competed among the noise and movement of the crowd in the bright autumn light. The trees lining the sidewalk were a riot of color, their falling leaves beginning to blanket the parked cars. She waited for a moment, confused, then began moving forward again. He kept walking behind her, just close enough to be a little unnerving, like her very own three-dimensional shadow.

_Or a small child_, she thought out of the blue, seeing a child so wrapped in layers against the fall chill she couldn't tell if it was a girl or a boy. It was so young its mother was pushing an empty stroller, just in case, and somehow managed to both cling to her hand and hide behind her at they walked around a corner.

She had just begun to chew that over properly when they arrived at the department store; they were accosted by a perfume lady as soon as they got through the doors, spraying something reeking sickeningly of lilies right in their faces.

"Do you like it?" she said, smile terrifyingly wide. "It's our new 'Earth's Savior' brand, inspired by the story of the heroine Aeris Gainsborogh…"

Tifa stamped down a sudden surge of irritation. "No, thank you," she said, smilingly politely as she breezed by. They hadn't gotten more than a few steps when she felt him grab her shirt.

"Tifa…"

She looked back at him and found herself biting back a fit of the giggles. The overzealous spray had gotten him right in the eyes; he was currently pressing his forearm against them and grimacing. A few steps to the right brought them to an eddy in the current of shoppers, and she dug in her tote for her water bottle and handkerchief. He was perfectly content to stand still while she wiped the worst of it away, eventually taking the kerchief and finishing the job himself.

"At least you don't squirm when I have to clean your face," she said, laughter bubbling up. It was really a bit ridiculous – he in his outlandish jumpsuit, claw, and multiple belts, dabbing daintily at his eyes with a pink-and-white monogrammed handkerchief. He paused and fixed her with a look that was equal parts affronted and mournful; she gave up and dissolved into giggles.

"Poor Vincent! All the way from Nibelheim just to have perfume sprayed in your eyes!"

Vincent drew himself up to his full height and held the kerchief out to her with a regal air. She took it with a slight, teasing curtsy, put it back in her bag and took his arm on impulse. He looked down at her, startled, and she smiled warmly up at him.

After a moment, the corners of his mouth raised and his eyes softened just slightly in response.

* * *

She had expected Vincent would need, well, _everything_, but she hadn't realized he literally owned nothing other than the clothes on his back and a small white cat. Somehow she'd been anticipating a run back to Nibelheim for things he'd left behind.

The store didn't charge that much, all things considered, but she still frowned a little when she saw the total and paid with a credit card. His hand touched her shoulder lightly.

"I'm sorry to be so much trouble," he said quietly, taking the bags and refusing to meet her eyes.

"It's no trouble," she insisted, snagging one of her own before he could take them all. "We'll be fine, don't worry so much."

He nodded hesitantly and waited for her to go ahead. As soon as they walked through the front doors he began to veer off back in the direction of the bar when he realized that wasn't where she was going and stopped short, almost causing a minor accident involving a half-blind old woman and a shopping cart. She hurried over to untangle him and realized that his hands were shaking slightly.

"What's wrong?" she said, pressing them lightly in her own. "Are you sick?"

She noticed with alarm that he had gone slightly paler than normal. Tension left long lines across his forehead, and his jaw was clenched.

"I'm fine. Really. Don't… don't worry, Tifa."

"Do you have a fever?" She reached up and pressed the back of her hand to his forehead. "It doesn't feel like it…"

"I didn't sleep well last night, that's all," he murmured, looking away from her. She stepped back and put her hands on her hips, bristling and stung. It seemed like every man she met was destined to pull away abruptly as soon as they'd let her get a little close…

"Vincent Valentine, you are _such_ a liar. You've been acting odd ever since we left the bar…" her voice trailed off as she remembered the child clutching at its mother, and the thought that had been interrupted by their arrival and the perfume lady. And then she realized.

Edge was a great bustling city now, full of life and noise and smells… a thousand different sensations competing for attention, a little overwhelming even for normal, human senses until you learned to process it. And his had been enhanced, hadn't they?

"I'm sorry," she said, taking his arm again. "I should have remembered that this would be more than you were used to. We can go back to the bar – well, I can drop you off, I have some other shopping to do."

"…I'm sorry," he said again, almost imperceptibly. Guilt washed over her and she ducked her head, keeping a loose hold on his arm as they walked down the street.

"It's my fault. I wasn't paying attention."

He bent his arm a bit so her hand rested in the crook. When she looked up, startled by the small, accepting gesture, she saw a little bit of light color creeping across his face.

"…when I'm near you…" he said, low and almost shy, though she had trouble assigning _that_ adjective to him. Aloof, surely, a little detached, acting colder than maybe he really was… he kept speaking, and she had to strain to hear him. "I don't… it doesn't affect me as much."

She flushed and bit at her lower lip, wordless.

"Well… that's good, isn't it?" she said finally, screwing up the courage to face his damnably unreadable red eyes. He nodded, and she didn't take her hand off his arm until they'd gotten back to Seventh Heaven and she had to open the door. He took the bag she'd been carrying from her and then just stood in the center of the bar, radiating awkwardness.

"Go upstairs and put things away, okay?" she said, smiling encouragingly. There was something almost sweet about how easily normal things confounded him, especially given how wise he seemed in other areas. "Like I said, I have to go do some other shopping. I won't be long. Marlene might come home before I do, but she knows you. The bar opens around eight, and then you're all mine." She grinned wickedly and mimed cracking a whip. His eyes widened and he took a step back; she giggled.

He scowled at her. "You are a singularly terrifying woman."

"I have to be, to keep you men in line. I'll be back soon." She turned on her heel and walked back through the door, idly twirling her keys on one finger and whistling a dimly-remembered song from years ago.

The grocery store wasn't far, and she preferred not to use her car for simple jaunts. Her bicycle had two messenger pouches attached, which _did_ mean daily grocery runs but had the advantage of not being completely hypocritical, given that she had nearly died to save the planet. Since mako energy had been discontinued, they were left with old-fashioned fossil fuels and electricity. They had the advantage of not sucking out the planet's life energy, but they weren't particularly kind to her either, and ShinRa had retarded research into alternate, environmentally-friendly fuel sources to the point where the scientists who would have the knowledge base required to create them probably hadn't even been born yet.

Besides, physical exertion helped keep her awake. The bar usually didn't close until the wee hours of the morning, and very often she finished closing only to come upstairs and start breakfast. She generally managed to catch a few hours' sleep before getting up to run errands and have a snack waiting for when the kid's got home from school. If she was really badly off, she'd have a nap while they did their homework, then haul herself out of bed to open the bar.

It was still better than the alternative. Exhaustion meant she didn't dream; and her dreams more and more frequently had been bizarre, twisted parodies of her memories that seeped into unsettling nonsense images. Her friends dangling like broken puppets from viscous strings, machines made of flesh and bone held together with rotten stitching, a sobbing woman with her head embedded in her chest, the nerves and arteries stretched and writhing…

Tifa closed her eyes briefly, putting on an extra turn of speed. The wind whipped her hair back and dried her sweat; all around her people moved through their lives in the bright autumn sun. She took it all in, breathing in a steady rhythm as she climbed a hill. Here were two young lovers embracing quite publicly, and there were a group of kids playing hokey jeering at them from across the street. Over there were two old men staring each other down over a magnetic chessboard. A gaggle of mothers mingled while their children squealed through playground equipment, some of them balancing the very youngest on their knees. Two schoolgirls giggled and darted furtively through the crowd, alive with their own mischief, and two grandmothers sitting in a café smiled indulgently.

The grocery store was miles of air-conditioning and tiles under cool fluorescent lights. Her boots clicked gently against the floor as she followed the path she knew so well by now she could probably do it in her sleep: bread, dairy, meat, vegetables… she thought for a moment, then headed over to the personal aisles and pulled out the most inoffensive and unscented soap, shampoo, and conditioner she could find. Vincent probably wouldn't appreciate smelling like a field of flowers. And he already smelled good, like leather and old books, not to mention he had the gentlest touch…

She turned bright red and dropped the shower stuff in her cart as though it had scalded her. Really, she was acting like someone half her age. It wasn't as though she had the _right_. He had never shown any interest, the brief moment in the cave aside, and she'd ruined that fairly quickly, hadn't she? She could have been soft and gentle, soothed his hurts and curled around him until he stopped shaking; instead she'd just added to his burdens.

Not that she would have done _that_ with him. It wouldn't be her he was seeing, and she couldn't do that – lie like that – again. But she could have done something other than leave a dent in the rock half an inch from his head and sob like a frustrated child. He had enough on his shoulders as is, and he had never asked to be her hero.

_"…so glad you're all right," he murmured, his human hand creeping out to squeeze hers lightly, and there was a glimmer of something torn and striving in his eyes. Later that night – unable to sleep for visions of pounding at metal walls until she smothered under poison gas – she went out to pace for a while and found him sitting in the hallway next to her room, Death Penalty cradled in his lap_.

"…ma'm?"

She blinked and came to herself to find the clerk looking at her as though she had two heads.

"Oh, sorry!" she gasped, digging in her purse. "I zoned out for a moment, that's all. Will this do?"

He took her card and ran it through, chuckling. "Hey, we've all been there."

* * *

The trip back to Seventh Heaven was wonderfully free of remembered dreams and disconcerting memories. Tifa locked the bike up around back and brought the groceries in, hearing Marlene's excited voice sifting down from upstairs; the door to her room was open, and what she saw when she passed by nearly made her drop the bags. 

"…and then Miss Hunt helped us make cookies, only they burnt because Joey, he's so mean, he always pulls my hair, anyway Joey and his stupid friends locked me and Emily and Kate and Teresa in the bathroom and Mister Josson had to come pick the lock and no one was paying attention so we didn't have cookies. But that's okay, because Joey and his stupid friends had to stay in during recess and do their times tables so we had the swings all to ourselves."

Vincent was kneeling at Marlene's small table, surrounded by stuffed animals and nodding gravely as she recited the thrilling events of the school day. The table was permanently set for an imaginary tea party; thankfully, things hadn't gotten that far yet. Marlene saw her before she could withdraw and have a good snicker in private.

"Tifa-mama!" she said, bouncing up and into the hallway. "You said Vincent came, and when I got home he was here!"

"I did say he was going to be staying with us for a while."

"I know," she said nonchalantly. "But you used to say that about Cloud, too."

Her stomach lurched and she tightened her grip on the bags, tears stinging the back of her eyes as her good mood dissipated. She'd been so emotional lately; it was getting a bit ridiculous.

"This is a little different, Marlene." Her voice was carefully even and cheerful, even lilting. "Vincent's agreed to help me with the bar. He doesn't have anywhere to stay in Edge right now, so he'll be living with us."

"Okay," Marlene said, totally sanguine. "Vincent, you should help with the groceries," she said with the imperious air only cats and small children can muster. He got up, and Tifa was surprised to see a smile hovering around his mouth.

"Tifa-mama?" he said, taking the bags from her. She let him have them, mildly stunned at the way the corners of his eyes were crinkling with suppressed laughter.

"She's called me that for a few months now. Ever since Cloud – " she cut off abruptly, feeling blood welling up under the old wound and not wanting him to know how badly she'd failed. "It doesn't matter."

"…it does to me," he said quietly, following her into the wide main room that served as kitchen, dining room and living space. She went over to the counter and braced herself against it without thinking, head bowed. He fell silent, and she realized he was still waiting for an explanation.

"He got better after the geostigma was cured. He really did," she said, aware of the quiet desperation in her voice and hating herself for it. "And then about a year ago he started running off again, not answering his phone or telling me where he was going."

Vincent put the bags on the counter and began unloading them. She went to help and he blocked her, gesturing to one of the chairs. Feeling that he was being entirely unreasonable, she sat, and kept talking despite her better judgment.

"…I tried. I called him every day when he was gone, I waited up for him. But he just went farther and farther away, and there was no _reason_. He started coming back smelling of flowers – he'd started sleeping at the church again." She watched Marlene take out her exercise book and set about her homework with a ferocious scowl, sitting on her hands and moving her lips as she tried to do sums in her head.

"It wasn't fair," she said abruptly. "It's alright if he chooses a memory over me, but he wasn't being fair to the children. Just when they'd started really trusting him again… Marlene started having nightmares, and Denzel just got angrier and angrier the longer Cloud stayed away. So I told him that if he couldn't take some responsibility for them anymore I… I couldn't be responsible for him."

While she had been staring into space, prying out the words to describe a memory so raw it made her want to scream and numb herself to the world, Vincent had stopped messing with the groceries and sat down next to her at the table. Now he reached out and almost covered her hand with his, his fingers lightly bent over hers.

"We fought," she said dully, resting her forehead in her other hand.

_"I'm so fucking sick of this!" he roared, standing and pounding a fist against the table with the force of his rage. "She meant everything to me! And all you can do is harp at me about how I need to do this, that, the other… I've lost her and she's never coming back and you're so fucking jealous you can't even let me mourn her!"_

_Shock was an icy wave, drenching her with cold and horror. His fury was an almost palpable force, slamming into her with incredible force, and she shrank back._

_"Cloud, no, that's not – "_

_"I don't want to hear it," he said, breathing heavily. "I can't stand the sight of you some days, you know that? I stuck around because I made a promise, but I can't remember why. All you've ever done is lie about our relationship, to yourself and everyone else. I'm sick of lies. You want me to leave – fine. I'll leave."_

_She had sat immobilized as he swept past, taking her breath with him and when she heard the door slam and Fenrir roar to life, speeding away, the last string snapped. She let her head fall __onto her arms, throat dry and tight and filled with sand, and found to her horror she had no tears to cry._

"…he left, and he hasn't come back. No one's heard from him since." Her hand clenched, dislodging his fingers, and she swallowed hard to press the memories down. When she looked up she knew her eyes were bright and her smile was genuine, or close enough.

"But that was months ago. I'm fine now." She got up and started putting the groceries away, partly to hide the way her hands were shaking but mostly so she didn't have to see the blatant disbelief in his eyes. After a few moments, he joined her. They were on the last bag when she glanced at his arm and realized he was wearing green, not black; she took a step back and blinked.

"I didn't even notice you'd changed!" she said. The corner of his mouth tilted up and he stepped back to the center of the room, executing what in a less dignified person would be called a twirl. She pressed her fist to her mouth, giddy joy welling up inside her. There was a harsh edge of mania to it, and she forced herself to swallow it down. He'd changed into khakis and an olive-green button-down shirt with the cuffs undone. It was long-sleeved, and covered the gauntlet almost entirely, save for his clawed hand.

"You're quite handsome, Mr. Valentine."

With a blink – she wondered if he knew just how terrifyingly fast he was sometimes – he was in front of her again and resting the tips of his hand against her cheek.

"And you're very beautiful, Ms. Lockhart," he said softly. Then he smiled at her: a true, deep, somewhat rusty but wonderfully real smile. The manic energy faded; he turned away and picked up the soap and such she had bought, taking it away to store it in the bathroom. He had just gotten to the hallway when a young voice piped up from the couch.

"Tifa-mama, I think you're pretty too."

The two adults glanced at each other. An electric shock ran through her when she met his eyes; there was something unexpectedly predatory there, lurking in the crimson depths.

"Tifa-mama's _very_ pretty, Marlene," he said, not taking his eyes off hers. Her breath caught in her chest, and she had to turn away.

Over the roaring of her blood and the sudden flooding heat she heard Marlene chastising him for saying the same thing twice. He told the young girl gravely that some things bore repeating and then was gone; she could sense him retreating down the hallway and gasped for air he'd somehow torn from her lungs.


	5. Chapter Five

**NEW CHAPTER YAY EVERYONE DO THE NEW CHAPTER DANCE. Much loff and snuggles to Tijuana Pirate, and also my infinitely patient beta, the fantabuous Ms. darknitedestiny**

**Can the authoress keep up her apparently winning stretch? God only knows.**

* * *

_Walking down the highway, walking through the park  
Looking out for something, still in the dark  
Don't know what to say when I see you smile  
So I guess I'll just turn my head and go on my way another mile_

"Passing Through," Bruce Hornsby

The water was cool on his skin. Vincent pressed his remaining hand hard against white porcelain, letting the droplets roll off his face and drip onto his collar. He'd gone too far, gotten too close and probably scared the life out of her. It had seemed the best way to smother the rage building in him; she hadn't needed to say anything, really. He'd known by the way her shoulders slumped and her head drooped, by the stiff, choked quality to her voice. That _idiot_ –

Breathe. In. Hold it. Out. Relax. Let it go.

He felt strangely clear-minded, sharp with purpose and more aware than he had been since those shuffling, frantic days of dull red doom hanging over their heads. Sluggish mental machinery was picking up speed, shedding rust and cobwebs as it went. Maybe it was this city, with all there was that needed to be focused on, monitored for threats and information. It might be the fact that he'd eaten and slept properly for the first time since… since AVALANCHE. It might just be her – her scent and voice, the brightness of her calling him back. He braced himself against the sink and leaned his forehead against the cool glass of the mirror, closing his eyes. Four years it had simmered in the back of his mind – and now, for no reason (_the brittle loss in her eyes the hitch in her voice the softness of her touch the kindness she carried like a shield_) it chose to boil over into the forefront of his consciousness.

The middle of someone's kitchen is really not the place to realize you've wanted them for years. More than raw physical attraction; wanting to wake next to her, help her tuck the children in at night, run mundane errands and unload groceries…

The cat nudged the door open and wound around his legs, purring. He picked her up absently and stroked her fur, wincing slightly as her claws penetrated his shirt. The material was much thinner than his leather jumpsuit. It made him feel a little exposed.

The admiration on her face was worth it.

Absently carrying the cat in one arm, he left the bathroom only to run into Denzel coming up the stairs, heavy backpack slung over one shoulder and both hands shoved in his pockets. The young man hunched over as he walked, scowling at the ground as though it had somehow offended him. Vincent stood silently, wondering if he should say hello: the question was answered for him when Denzel stopped (having apparently caught sight of the gunman's feet) and looked up.

"Oh. Hi."

"Good afternoon, Denzel." He stiffened slightly, taken aback by the guardedness in the boy's eyes.

"You're still here," he seemed compelled to point out.

"So I am."

Denzel made a dismissive noise under his breath and went on to the kitchen, Vincent trailing bemusedly behind. As they went back to the main room, Marlene looked up, saw the cat, and let out an ear-splitting shriek.

"_Kitty!_"

She launched herself at Vincent, a cannonball of small child, and made a grab for the cat. The cat, rightly horrified, dug her claws into his shoulder and chest and sprang for freedom, scratching him through his shirt before bounding off along the hallway, Marlene in hot pursuit. Tifa was frozen between the fridge and the counter, hand halfway to her mouth, and Denzel calmly walked past her to grab a soda out of the fridge.

"'M not hungry," he said, staring fixedly at the soda as he popped open the tab. "I've got a lotta homework." Then he trudged back along the hall into his room. The door slammed shut.

"…ow," Vincent said stiffly.

"Vincent!" Marlene came wailing down the hall. "The kitty won't come out from under your bed!"

"I… she isn't that used to people. You should be gentle with her," he said vaguely, pressing his human hand distractedly against the scratches. "Hmm. Maybe if you left her alone for a while?"

Her face crumpled, and he looked desperately to Tifa for guidance, feeling the old grey confusion buzzing and swirling in the back of his mind. She hid a smile behind her hand and turned away. He saw her shoulders shaking and glared.

"Maybe if you finish your homework, Vincent will convince the kitty to come out," she suggested, chopping the sweet peppers she had been holding. "But you'll have to be very calm around her, okay?"

Marlene nodded and went back to her couch. He realized that Tifa had just delegated the task of soothing the hellbeast that was likely even now hissing and spitting under his bed to him, and felt himself deflate slightly.

"Oh, and Vincent?" Tifa said, turning to face him. He looked at her.

"Welcome to Seventh Heaven," she said, and there was the faintest gleam of wicked humor in her eyes.

* * *

The door opened, letting in a gust of cool air. Vincent looked up… and up some more… and finally found himself meeting pale, perfectly blue eyes, interestingly without a trace of mako. He blinked, and the stranger looked away. 

"George!" Tifa said, going to greet the huge man. "This is Vincent," she said. "He'll be helping out for a while, okay?"

The huge man ducked his head once. "Alright," he said shyly, voice surprisingly light.

"Vincent, this is George. He's my cook."

George was a giant of a man, all long legs and hunched shoulders and skinny elbows held tight at his side. Thin, ragged brown hair framed a long, square face; he wore simple, thick clothing against the autumn chill. He didn't carry himself like a fighter, Vincent noticed clinically, noting the uneven muscular development and concluding that while huge and strong, he was most likely a civilian.

"Why don't you take Vincent into the kitchen and show him where things are?" Tifa said, moving behind the cash register. "I know I said I only needed bookkeeping done, but I can always use an extra hand when things get busy," she added apologetically. "It's easier if you already know where things are… the office is right in the back, I won't call you unless I need you."

George nodded and shuffled towards the door next to the bar, moving with all the care of someone who spent their formative years accidentally breaking everything they touched. Vincent followed, somewhat at a loss; Tifa had never mentioned him.

The kitchen was small, clean and bright, and George straightened as soon as he entered, unfurling to stand nearly a head taller than Vincent, and reached casually for one of the pans hanging neatly above the window to the bar. Vincent faded quietly into a corner and watched him set everything neatly in place with a loose-limbed ease nothing like the nervous, withdrawn exterior he had presented before.

As he set up for the evening, he spoke clearly and quietly, saying this was always to go here, and that could go there or over there, it didn't matter, and various other things Vincent committed to memory. After a time, he realized George was deliberately trying not to meet his eyes.

"How long have you been working here?" The question surprised him as much as it did George, coming unbidden and refusing to submit to the usual analysis before being asked.

"Miss Tifa hired me six months ago," he said, stopping and resting his hands on the edge of the sink.

"I see…"

"Are you one of Miss Tifa's friends from the war?" There was an unexpected sharpness in his voice, and Vincent blinked a little, uncrossing his arms.

"…yes."

The huge man's head bent, and his shoulders stiffened.

"Miss Tifa is a good person," he said slowly, raising his head briefly to check that she wasn't nearby. She was on the other side of the room, setting up the booths. "She's been through a lot."

Vincent nodded, then realized belatedly that there was no way George could have seen it. It didn't stop him.

"She's very kind. To everyone. Even people who don't deserve it." His fingers tightened slightly on the rim of the sink.

"She is," Vincent said, sensing the tension in the room rise and not entirely sure why, until he moved a few feet to the right and saw the determined set of the other man's jaw.

"I am… going to be doing the bookkeeping," he said finally, not really knowing how to reassure him and marveling at her gift for inspiring loyalty. "And… anything else she needs help with," he finished lamely, moving towards the exit back to the bar.

"I see," George said quietly. When Vincent was almost to the door, the giant spoke again in the measured rhythm of a recitation.

"And because I am happy, and dance and sing, they think they have done me no injury..."

He paused with his hand on the door, dim schoolroom memories stirring, and his lips moved in the last lines of the poem.

"I understand," he said finally. Then he left the kitchen and shut the door behind him.

Tifa had finished with the booths; now she'd vanished into the office. Something clattered, she swore, and then emerged with a new bottle of wood polish and a rag.

"All yours!" she said with a cheerful grin. "It's in no kind of order, I'm afraid. But it's pretty soundproof, and it has a window, so you should be okay. I'll just give the bar a final polish and we'll be open for business!"

She shot past him, moving with all the energy and enthusiasm that had called to him four years ago. Something clenched around his heart and he watched for a little too long as she attacked the bar, hair falling loose along her back and arms, moving with a careless grace and a ready smile. She was easy to read, even more so now that he was focusing again – the slight tension across her back and shoulders, how she swayed slightly with the low hum of whatever song she was singing to herself. For a moment – just a second – time slipped away from him again, whirled and focused and stretched itself until his entire world was _her, _the play of muscles under her skin, the graceful lines she sketched in the air as she moved about her routines. When she looked up, puzzled at feeling his gaze still on her, he saw her begin to move long before she did and vanished into the office.

He stopped short and blinked. Conscientious as Tifa usually was, he had expected the office to be at least slightly organized, even if it was slightly confused organization of somehow who had no idea what they were doing. Instead he found papers piled haphazardly on the desk, spilling over to the floor, a stack of boxes that almost engulfed the window filled, if the labels were any indication, with receipts, and an open storage cupboard full of cleaning supplies.

First things first. He waded through the paper and shut the cabinet. Then he turned around and shoved all the paper off the desk. A quick rummage through it turned up a half-used packet of blank labels and a couple marker pens, and the file cabinet across from the storage cupboard was filled with unlabeled hanging and manila folders.

He could work with that.

* * *

The hours drifted by and merged into one another as he sorted through the seemingly endless sheaves of paper, paying idle attention to the rise and fall of voices and music from the bar and the bright night noises filtering through the open office window. Mostly he let his mind wander; once he figured out what kinds of papers there were and where they should go it became an almost mechanical act, leaving him with a great deal of time to think. 

There was no honorable way to back out, not now that he knew how much she needed an extra pair of hands. Nor could he simply take her in his arms and _tell_ her, shelter and protect her _to have and to hold until death do you part…_

Think about it logically, he could almost hear his old mentor saying. As though it had nothing to do with you.

Why shouldn't he love her? He had that much control, surely (_liar liar __liar_). There was no need for her to ever know… he could love her as a friend (_and see her lost to the years and another man_). It was natural to expect a certain amount of emotional confusion, he rationalized brilliantly. He hadn't opened himself up to anyone since his awakening four years ago (_because who else but her could there ever be?_). It would be unfair to invest her in something that was no more than a passing fancy (_her lips her skin her hair her smell the way she smiled and held her pain inside and how easy it would be to reach out and carry her_).

It was easy, after that was resolved, to clear his mind and focus on the mechanics, lulling himself into a state of easy meditation (_and her dark eyes dilated in the deep below the mountain, soft lips warm skin and __– _).

He had gotten through nearly half the loose papers when he noticed the noise of the crowd had died. The sky visible through the buildings was dark gray with false dawn, and he leaned back in the rickety wooden chair and stretched out of pure habit, surprising himself when bones popped and muscles creaked gratefully. He could still hear Tifa closing up.

A few short steps brought him out of the office and into the bar proper, where he saw her polishing the bar, again, rows of sparkling glasses stacked neatly behind her. As he watched, she finished – with the bar so clean it was nearly blinding – and began polishing it again, right to left instead of left to right.

"…I think it's clean," he said, bemused. She looked up, eyes wide, and he noticed again the dark circles marring her eyes.

"Vincent! I didn't… I mean, you weren't… I thought maybe… why aren't you in bed?"

"Why aren't you?"

"Oh, well, I haven't finished cleaning up," she said too quickly, and he cast a disbelieving glance around the bar. It looked as though it had never seen a day of use: every table in every booth was scrubbed within an inch of its life, all furnishings carefully put away and the leather benches oiled and gleaming. The floor was clean enough to eat off; the overall impression was of magazine perfection.

"So I see," he said, one eyebrow raising slightly.

"Go on to bed, okay?" She wouldn't look at him, focusing entirely on the bar, and he walked over to her before his protesting mind could intervene, obeying the whispers just under his conscious thoughts.

"Tifa…" his voice was low, too low, murmuring bedroom huskiness. She was startled into looking up and he was caught in her huge dark eyes, and the fear he saw there. The sharp, cornered fear of a child with their head under the blankets and all the lights on…

"…how long have you been having nightmares?"

"I don't… I haven't…"

He let the silence echo between them. She dropped her gaze and loosened her grip on the rag hanging limply from her fingers.

"For a while, now. Since Cloud…" and she was so small then, pulling into herself, that all he wanted was to take her and run. "It's not important, really," she said, mustering a shadow of her nuclear grin. "I mean, who wouldn't have nightmares after what we've been through? I just got used to having someone in the room, that's all."

"Go to bed," he said quietly, letting a note of pleading enter his voice. It was easy to avoid dreams, sleepwalk and catnap your way through the day out of habit and sheer bloody-mindedness. He'd been doing it for the past four years, after all. But he was hardly human, and what was mildly inconvenient for him would be torture for her.

"I'm fine, really, I don't need…" She flushed a furious red and redoubled her efforts to shine the bar into oblivion. He'd cleaned his guns that way, obsessively, praying for order to stave off the chaos and the terror every time he closed his eyes.

He moved without thinking again, whisking behind the counter faster than she could react and slinging her over his shoulder in a fireman's carry. She shrieked indignantly and pounded on his back, demanding to be put down right _now_, Vincent Valentine, or _else_, and he ignored her entirely as he trudged up the stairs. By the time he reached the top she had given up and started sulking.

"You are so _dead_," she said with all the steel of affronted dignity, and he bit his lip to keep from smiling. The door to her room was slightly open, making it the work of moments to let her down gently on her bed and stand well out of range of her right hook.

She glowered at him.

"Sleep," he insisted (_and do you mind if I crawl into bed with you and chase all the demons away?_). "I..." and he clenched his human hand convulsively. "If you want, I will stay," he said, pointing to a chair in the corner of the room. "But you must sleep, Tifa."

"You're not my mother," she said petulantly, then grimaced. "That was mature."

"I have some experience with nightmares," he said quietly, and she looked up. "You cannot let them rule you," he said, pleading silently with her to understand: it was so easy to surrender, and run, and hide, and let yourself be broken (_and if she breaks what earthly thing is left?_).

Silence stretched unbearably between them.

"…alright," she said, finally. "I… will you stay?" Her eyes were downcast, and she wrung the sheets between her fingers.

"Of course. Call me when you are ready. I will be outside," he said, turning away and hating the stiffness in his voice. She nodded, and for a moment he almost fancied she was disappointed, and his blood surged at the thought that she might want him to truly _stay_, to press her close and shield her.

"Vincent?"

"Yes?" He looked back over his shoulder.

"…thank you. For looking out for me."

"It is the least I can do."


	6. Chapter Six

**I should be doing my French homework. Instead I'm posting this. Appreciate it.**

**One more chapter and an epilogue after this.**

* * *

_I tried to reach you on Valentine's Day  
But how can I reach you, when you're so far away?  
Don't make me a victim, don't make me a clown  
With my arms reaching out and my head hanging down_

"Breakin The Rules," Robbie Robertson

Waking came slow and easy; she stretched languorously on her back and rolled over, tucking herself into a neat little ball and letting her head sink into the pillow. It was still dark outside. Her alarm hadn't even gone off. She could still sleep a few more minutes…

That was an oddly familiar thought. _Recently_ familiar, too. Which made no sense. She cracked an eye open and groped for the digital clock on her bedside table, blinking sleep from her eyes as she brought it up to her face.

"…I'm going to kill him," she muttered, voice whisper-dry and cracked with sleep, and put the clock back on the table. She slid out of bed and stretched again, reaching for the ceiling and running a hand through her hair. Early afternoon sunlight flooded the room as she pulled up the blinds with a quick, almost violent movement. He must have turned off her alarm clock and drawn the blinds to keep the sun from waking her – oh, he was a sneaky one, alright. And she was going to kill him. Probably. Well, maybe not.

It depended on how good a job he'd done of getting the day started without her.

She might still bruise him a bit, just to get the point across.

Wrapping herself in her bathrobe, she padded out into the hall and heard the clatter of dishes. Vincent had his back to her, cleaning up after breakfast. The entire room had been tidied up, and she noticed the faint pine-scent of cleaner.

"I suppose you're very proud of yourself," she said, mildly irritated that everything seemed to be in order.

"I made coffee," he offered, turning around with his sleeves rolled up and suds on his hands. "I'd get it for you, but…" he shrugged and nodded at the sink. Several dishes were already set on the drying rack.

"It's okay. Did the kids get off to school?"

"Eventually."

"Denzel needed a crowbar to pry him out of bed?"

"I was expecting it."

She blinked and set the coffee press down a little harder than necessary, wincing as the sharp thud and picking it up again to check for cracks. For a minute she thought he chuckled.

"I was a teenage boy once, too."

"It's hard to think of you ever being young." She stirred in some sugar and yawned, lost in a rather pleasant haze.

"How cruel, Tifa."

Startled, she whirled to face him. "No! I didn't mean it like – " But his eyes were glinting, and his mouth was twitching a little around the edges. She turned back to her coffee, smiling despite herself. "It's not fair to tease when I've just woken up."

"Noted," he said gravely, drying a dish with a surprising amount of finesse despite the claw's insistent clacking. "What would you like for breakfast?"

"You cook?"

"My mother taught me. Dad used to joke with her – saying that he'd never stray, because no one was quite as good in the kitchen. That sort of thing."

"Parents, cooking, childhood… you have hidden depths, Vincent Valentine." Now it was her turn to bite back a grin as he started for a second, and had to turn and look at her before relaxing.

"I can't tell you all my secrets," he said lightly, putting the last dish on the drying rack. "Some things, a man just has to keep to himself."

"Have you told Cid that?"

"Cid is a dirty liar. Don't believe anything he says."

"Or maybe you have something to hide?"

"Do you want breakfast or not?"

"Touchy, touchy…"

Morning faded into day, and days into weeks as the leaves turned to flame and began to fade. Life settled into a comfortable routine, patterns establishing themselves, and as the days grew darker she felt herself growing paradoxically lighter. The nightmares lessened; the bar prospered as Vincent got the books in order and _dealt _with certain vendors with questionable pricing methods; even the force of Denzel's glare towards the interloper began to diminish.

He had quiet way of making things easier for her, though he never went as far as he had that first night. In fact, he began to show a strange reluctance to touch her – he didn't avoid her, sometimes he seemed determined to turn himself into her shadow – but he had brushed against her and then snatched himself away enough that she was beginning to wonder if something was wrong. Little things, like a vase of flowers appearing (vervain and orange blossoms) nowhere obtrusive, but where she'd be bound to see it. Nothing overt, nothing obvious, just pebbles rolling downhill; if she listened she could hear the rumble and feel the ground shake, but it was easier not to. Maybe, this once, she could pretend, and if she pretended hard enough, it would be real.

It happened in the daylight, not the dark. They were making dinner: she was chopping vegetables, onions, and they were making her cry. She knew he hadn't planned it this way, could see it in his eyes when he turned and wiped at her tears unthinkingly, stroking the delicate skin under her eyes.

Her eyes slid shut as he whispered her name, a question and a plea, and her hands came up to clutch his collar, smoothed over his shirt. Her arms wrapped around him; she could feel the muscles shifting under his skin as he leaned in, bracing himself on the counter and pressed his mouth to hers, controlled and trembling and careful and eager all at once. He was warm, warm and solid and _(beloved)_ it had been so, so long since she'd had anyone this close, this _real_...

She relaxed and opened up, allowed herself to want and he groaned somewhere deep in his chest, pulled her close and wrapped his arm around her waist. The reverberation in his chest – his obvious pleasure – made her giddy as something slow and warm blossomed in response. Her shirt had ridden up and clever fingers stroked her spine, nails ran lightly up her back and it was –

_a thousand times before he'd come whispering silksoft against her skin and begging forgiveness of a woman that wasn't her for a crime that wasn't his and never, ever remembering come the day_

– she inhaled sharply and turned her face away, almost lost when he took it in stride and began trailing kisses down her jaw instead, nipping lightly at the skin and rumbling, deep and satisfied. Oh ye gods, he was _good_; her thoughts swirled away from her as his clever mouth tugged and soothed.

"Vincent…" her breath caught. "Vincent, stop."

He stopped, and she felt almost bereft – but grateful, because she couldn't _think_ when he did that, that thing he was doing right now with his rich red eyes all dark and hot and

…distant and unfocused and unseeing…

"No," she said. "No," again, a little more firmly. "I can't. Not again. I'm sorry."

She pushed him away, recoiling from his outstretched hand. "Tifa, I don't understand. Did I… Did you not… Tifa…"

Too late. She was walking away, tears stinging her eyes and sand in her throat as he called after her, bewildered.

"I'm sorry…"

She went into her bedroom and closed the door, trying to remember how to breathe. The cat had been sitting on her pillow and jumped down when she sat heavily on the bed, purring anxiously. Tifa-the-cat propped her front legs on Tifa-the-human's thighs, kneading, and she scratched the animal's head absently.

Five minutes. She'd allow herself five minutes to grieve and then she would go out and help him pack and not cry at all when he left because there was no way she could give him what he needed. She'd tried it with Cloud and only made him worse, let him hold on _(because how could she tell him to let go?)_ and… and it wouldn't work. It wouldn't. She wasn't anyone's salvation. He would thank her, in the end, he would see that she wasn't what he wanted and be relieved that he didn't have to hurt her.

Three minutes now.

He'd kept up his nightly vigils, staying until she fell into deep sleep and the room bore faint traces of his scent – smoke and leather and clean soap. If she lay on the bed and closed her eyes she could see him sitting in the chair by the door, watching her. Watching _over_ her: a new figure had invaded her nightmares, cloaked in shadow and filled with light…

Her subconscious had always had a bit of a flair for the dramatic.

Two minutes.

Breathe in, hold it. Out – relax and let it go.

It would be alright.

He would understand.

Denzel screaming her name penetrated her hard-won serenity and she flung herself off the bed without thinking, tearing out the door to see Vincent hunched over in the hallway and vomiting. Marlene was standing in her bedroom doorway, tearful and terrified and Denzel had the phone in his hand, halfway certain of what he should do next.

"Call an ambulance," she half-cried, falling to her knees next to him. Her head spun and buzzed and the whole situation seemed impossible, unreal. "What…?"

"Aspirin," he choked, and heaved again. It was tinged red this time. "Headache."

"How…?" But she knew how, even as he buried his claw in the wall and screamed in agony. He'd been _changed_, more deeply than any of them, and it was… well, odd, but not implausible that he hadn't taken aspirin in the years since they woke him up… "Oh god, Vincent."

He coughed, once, and drooled sputum on the stinking mess. She wrapped one of her arms around his torso, one of his arms around her neck, and managed to maneuver him into the bathroom. His head lolled; he couldn't seem to manage his limbs, and his eyes were hooded and lost.

"Hurts…"

"I called the hospital," Denzel said from the bathroom doorway. She lowered Vincent onto the tile and he collapsed in a shivering heap. Needing to do something and knowing there was nothing she _could_ do, she dampened a washcloth and wiped some of the drool away, keeping him on his side in case he vomited again. "What now?"

"I… how long?"

"Just a couple minutes, they said."

"Take care of Marlene."

Denzel nodded, face drawn and pale, and vanished. Vincent gave an anguished groan and convulsed, nearly coming off the floor with the force of it.

"_Hurts_," he hissed, and rolled on his stomach, bracing himself on his elbows. "Tifa… take the children… run..." and he groaned again, a groan that turned into a growl; his eyes began to glow and his teeth lengthened...

She screamed something incoherently defiant, furious, and threw her arms around him. He writhed against her and she cursed him for a fool, begged him, pleaded with the creatures under his skin to just let him go, just this once, _fight_ it for god's sake, _fight – _blinding pain lanced through her shoulder and he went limp again, breathing hard. She touched her shoulder in a daze – red and warm and sticky… blood. Oh god. He'd _bitten_ her.

Sirens outside, and footsteps on the stairs. White-uniformed EMTs burst in and loaded him on a stretcher while time twisted and distorted and she answered questions as best she could. Someone had to go with him – there was only her – she told Denzel to call Cid and Shera and climbed in, shoulder tacky with her own drying blood; it was when she winced that one of the EMTs noticed and began to patch her up. The world wanted to slip away and she held onto it, held his hand and kept on breathing.

"How long?" one asked the driver, tense and worried.

"Five minutes. Maybe less."

* * *

The goddamn phone. Was goddamn _ringing._ At five in the _goddamn_ morning. 

Shera wiggled out from under his arm to pick it up. He grabbed her wrist.

"Let it go t'fucking voicemail, woman," he mumbled sleepily.

"It might be important," she protested, pulling her hand away and sitting up

"They'd call my fucking PHS if it was that fucking _urgent_," he muttered, turning to lie on his back. Eyes hooded, he still knew she was smiling at him with that soft, indulgent look he'd never admit to loving.

"Denzel?" He opened his eyes, startled. "What… slow down, dear, I can't understand you – "

"Gimme that." Cid snatched the phone from her. "What?" he barked, then fell silent.

"…the hospital? And she's gone with him? …right. Gimme six hours. Keep Marlene calm." He hung up and got out of bed, fumbling in the half-light of the lamp for his clothes.

"What happened?"

"Vincent's in the goddamn hospital. Got fuckin' sick off something. Tifa's gone with him. Gotta roust the crew, get the _Shera_ going…"

She was already out of bed and heading for the closet. "I'll pack."

* * *

The emergency room was a strange blur of white ammonia stench, hurry-up-and-wait while he was wheeled off somewhere and a kind nurse put a few stitches in her shoulder. She could see Vincent in the other room, white coats bustling around him with tubes and bits of this and that, tools she couldn't quite make out and probably wouldn't understand the use of anyway. The nurse noticed her craning her neck to see around the labcoats and patted her unwounded shoulder in a matronly way. 

"You're all set. Go see your friend."

She was only halfway there when someone detached from the phalanx surrounding his gurney and came to meet her, carrying a clipboard and a carefully concerned, yet confident face – _doctor expression # 4, for dealing with potentially hysterical relatives_ – her mind was all fever and helium. She closed her eyes for a second, breathing, and forced her thoughts in order.

"Ms. Lockhart?"

"That's me. Is he – ?"

"It's a little too early to tell," she said with a practiced, reassuring smile. "We're pumping his stomach right now. I have to ask you a few questions, if it's alright?"

"Yes. Yes, of course, I – whatever you need…"

"How long have you known Mr. Valentine?"

"Four years. A little more, maybe."

"And what relationship do you have with him?"

Her throat went dry and she knew she was flushing. "Well, we're friends, I suppose. He came to live with me and help out at the bar a few months ago, after – well, my boyfriend – "

"I see." A quick scribble of pen across paper. "Any allergies that you know of?"

"He's never mentioned any."

"Now, I realize you might not want to betray his confidence," the doctor was very sure to make eye contact all of a sudden, "and I respect that, but it's very important that you tell us – has he ever, to the best of your knowledge, had any problems with depression? Suicidal thoughts?"

"…what?"

"He's been very badly poisoned. This sort of thing doesn't happen by accident, Ms. Lockhart."

"No, I'm sorry, you don't understand – "

"This must be hard for you to accept, but it's in his best interests – "

"Can I finish?" She let herself glare slightly and the doctor shut her mouth abruptly, blinking. "He – he worked for ShinRa, a long time ago. And ShinRa… used him. As a specimen." She chose her words carefully. "Not willingly."

Before the doctor could speak again, an intern shouted and broke away. "He's hemorrhaging!"

"What?" Her head was starting to pound from the unrelenting antiseptic smell; she could see the panic flit briefly across the doctor's face before she called instructions over her shoulder, guiding Tifa to a seat.

"Ms. Lockhart, you're going to have to stay here – "

"What's going on? – Where are they taking him?"

"The operating room. We'll do everything we can. Don't worry."

And with those less than reassuring words, she left Tifa sitting on a hard plastic seat surrounded by the detritus of the night – old men coughing blood into handkerchiefs, mothers cradling children lethargic with fever or pain, and a few scattered souls like herself, faces pinched with worry and fear, waiting for news.

* * *

Dawn was creeping up on Edge when the _Shera_ finally touched down just outside in the bones of what would one day be a proper airport. At the moment only WRO ships were allowed to land there; Cid had radioed ahead and told them to clear a space, without bothering to ask if they could. They knew him, and did it without complaining. 

The light was clear and cold and had a peculiar stretched feeling of night still clinging with bony fingers when Cid and Shera pulled into the driveway in the small groundcar that had been squirreled away in the hold for just this sort of thing. The bar was dark: the upstairs windows were lit, and a face appeared briefly in one before vanishing. A few minutes later Denzel was racing down the stairs and throwing open the door, haggard eyes far too old for his face.

"Finally."

"Where's Marlene?" Shera said, heading straight for the stairs.

"Upstairs. She wouldn't stop crying – "

Cid brushed past him, pulling out his PHS. "Tifa bring her phone with her?"

"Yeah, she called us from the hospital – they had to put him in surgery – "

"_Shit_." He hit buttons violently, nearly stomping up the stairs and feeling his bones ache in protest. This only served to irritate him further and he kept up a low stream of vitriol as he waited for her to pick up.

"…fucking spooky depressing bastard, call this fucking friendship, didn't even fucking tell me he was moving in, _fuck_…"

"Cid?" Tifa sounded exhausted.

"Where the hell are you?"

"The hospital."

"I fuckin' know that! I mean where the hell is the damn hospital? And what the hell happened?"

"Oh." She gave him directions, and told him what she knew. "…he got out of surgery a little while ago, they're talking about moving him from the ICU and letting him wake up. Apparently he's recovering faster than usual. Took them a while to find a sedative that worked…"

"Yeah, I'll be there. Shera's got the kids." He didn't have to check to know it was true. Whatever was wrong, she could handle it; it was what she was good at.

"Bring a change of clothes or something." Her voice cracked and splintered just a bit.

"You sound like death warmed over."

"I didn't exactly sleep well," she said wryly. "I'll be fine. I'm just on my way to get some breakfast."

"You do that. Be there in a few." He hung up and started opening doors at random, looking for Vincent's room, and only jumped a little when Shera opened the correct door from the inside, holding Marlene. The girl was clinging to her, one small fist wrapped in her shirt.

"Is Vincent going to die?" she whispered, tear-stained eyes half-closed.

"Hell fucking no," he said, and rolled his eyes as Shera gave him a Look. "I just called Tifa. She says he's fine." It was a little bit of a fib, true, and he could tell by her raised eyebrow that Shera knew it. Still, it wouldn't hurt the kid to not have to deal with the hardest version of the truth for once her short life. "She also says we should pack up some clothes and shit for him, I don't know."

"There was a duffel bag in his closet," Shera said, standing aside so he could see the aforementioned bag on the bed, opened and half-filled with clothes and books. "I know hospitals are dull, so I thought he might like some books. I took what was on his shelves."

"Shera?" Marlene whispered. "Can I go to my room and get something for him?"

"Of course, honey. Do you want me to go with you?" Marlene shook her head and unclenched her hand; Shera put her down and she darted out of the room. Cid met her eyes when she straightened and shook his head.

"I didn't lie to her, Shera. The doctors say he's recovering fast. Apparently he's allergic to goddamn aspirin or some shit."

"Was that _all?_"

"Well, she said something about surgery."

"Oh my god," she said, putting a hand to her heart. "Poor Tifa!"

"Poor Tifa? Poor fuckin' _Vincent_. Guy takes a couple aspirin, next thing he's puking his guts out…"

"You _know_ what I mean, Cid Highwind."

He snorted and started going through Vincent's desk idly, thinking there might be something he'd want. Behind him, he knew Shera would be finishing with the duffel bag, and he heard Marlene come back in, hesitant steps on creaking wooden boards.

In the third drawer on the right he found a stack of loose papers and flipped through them without thinking. A picture slid out on the floor; picking it up, he saw it was one of Tifa and the children, recent from the look of it – Marlene grinning hugely, Denzel scowling irritably, and Tifa with the smile she'd had the past few years – tempered, quieter than the huge bright thing he remembered (god, she'd been so young then!), somehow wistful. He flipped it over and scanned the careful script on the back.

_When, in disgrace with Fortune and men's eyes_

_I all alone beweep my outcast state_

_And trouble deaf Heaven with my bootless cries…_

It sounded familiar, and he skipped a few lines

_Yet in these thoughts, myself almost despising_

_Haply I think on thee and then my state_

_Like to the lark at break of day arising_

_From sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven's gate_

Oh. _That_ poem. He carefully replaced the picture among the papers in the drawer and left off looking through the desk, overcome with a vague sense of having violated something better left alone.

"Cid?"

Shera was holding the duffel out to him. He took it and, impulsively, pulled her off-balance so she stumbled and landed against him, her glasses slightly askew. His heart did a quick, painful little dance before he kissed her, soft and sweet.

"Goodness," she said when he finally let her go. "What was _that_ all about?"

"…dunno. Just… nevermind. Look after the kids, will ya?"

"Of course. Call me when you get to the hospital."

"Yeah," he said, already halfway out the door.

* * *

Vincent looked entirely too small and broken, lying in the hospital bed with an IV in his right arm. His left was shriveled at his side and she couldn't bring herself to look at it with more than the corner of her eye. They'd taken the claw off to try and see how it worked, before she'd barged into the ICU and yelled at people until they left him alone. 

They'd taken him off sedatives some time ago; afraid to give him whatever concoction they normally used to wake up patients, the doctors had opted to let him sleep it off. A plastic container filled with cold, greasy eggs and too-crisp bacon was sitting on the table where she'd left it, unable to stomach the food and the silence. The cheap, bitter hospital coffee had left a film on her mouth and she desperately wanted to go buy some gum, but she couldn't very well leave him to wake up alone.

He was moaning again.

He'd been muttering and crying softly in his sleep for a while now, half-conscious, presumably caught in a nightmare. However many times she'd whispered that he was alright, it was just a hospital – even half-singing a few verses from mostly lost childhood songs – he didn't seem to hear her.

That, also, had been wearing.

But now he was actually speaking – turning slightly, straining, tied by invisible bonds.

"…no. Please, no… stop… no more."

"Vincent, it's alright." Her throat was dry, her voice no more than a whisper, too weak to penetrate his delusion.

"Lucrecia…"

She took his hand instead, stroking her thumb across the back.

"…Tifa?" His eyes fluttered. She swallowed, hard.

"I'm here." A little louder. "I'm here, Vincent."

"…then it's alright…" His fingers tightened around her hand briefly, and he relaxed into the thin mattress.

"How much longer?" She started and turned to see Cid standing in the doorway with a duffel bag and the look of a man who's just put his finger on some elusive solution.

"They're not sure," she said, stifling a yawn. "I think it won't be long, though."

Cid focused on her for the first time and she smiled at the shock on his face. "Do I look that bad?"

"Have you gotten any fuckin' sleep, woman?"

"I catnapped. You know."

"God_damn_. Go home and take a fuckin' nap or somethin'."

"I don't want him to wake up here alone." She turned back to Vincent, the conversation over as far as she was concerned. Cid wasn't finished.

"I'll babysit the spooky asshole, Tif. Christ, you're gonna scare him into a relapse, lookin' like that. Go _home_."

He paced around to the other side of the bed and she kept herself calm, floating half-dead in her own exhaustion. "No. I don't think I will." She stood. "But I will get us some coffee, okay?" A grin she could feel cracking her lips, unnatural and stretched and tired, _so_ tired she wished for a second she had just left him to rot in his _damn_ mansion with his _damn_ memories –

_and his lips soft and eager on her mouth, his hand trailing lightly up her spine, his rusted smile, his patience, his silent, constant, unobtrusive presence_

– she straightened her shoulders and left for more of a vile swill they claimed was coffee.


	7. Chapter Seven

A/N: Long chapter is loooooong. Extended authorial thoughts after the end of the epilogue.

* * *

_I'm afraid the world will die without a sound  
__I was just trying to say something beautiful, something meaningful__  
B__ut__ you can't live in the world just breathing, beautiful__  
N__o, you can't live in the world just being meaningful_

"People Talk," Wintersleep

_He was sinking down deep and dark and restful and everything was far away on the other side of the mirror._

_The bottom was cool and calm and blessedly silent all the screams muffled just like he remembered so he opened his mouth to swallow and die and then she said his name._

_Lungs burning he kicked against the bottom and swam into the sun_.

He exploded out of sleep, gasping and pulling instinctively away from metal needle in his arm. There was a high-pitched scream and someone skittered away, then someone was grabbing at him. Citrus and sage. He opened his eyes.

"…where am I?"

"The hospital. Don't you remember?"

Tifa, soft and worried; he focused with a sense of pained inevitability on her mouth as memory came hurtling back. She had been… he'd kissed her, knowing it was stupid, knowing he should know better, violating the unspoken truce between them and she had run. Then he'd taken some aspirin, just for the pounding in his head, because the children still needed tending to – and there had been pain, screaming pain and wings beating in the back of his mind –

He looked up, horror singing through him. "Are the children alright?"

"Yes, they're fine," she soothed, sitting down at his side. "You didn't… we didn't have any visitors, if that's what you mean."

"…good." He was remembering more, now. Agonizing, blinding pain, the raw scratch of vomit in his throat and his mouth filling with copper and salt. When she let him up, he saw her wince and his eyes were drawn inexorably to the white bandage peeking from under her torn shirt.

"I hurt you."

"We'll talk about it later, okay? The nurse wanted to draw some blood." She was still holding his hand; right then, he would have agreed to anything just to keep her near.

The trembling, white-faced woman had backed into the corner of the room, holding a syringe like a weapon.

"I'm sorry," he said as humbly as he could, forcing himself to stillness. "I don't really like hospitals."

"I'll just – I'll just tell the doctor you've woken up – " She fled, trailing fear-scent in the air behind her.

"Oops." He couldn't help an ironic little grin as he said it. Tifa sighed and rolled her eyes, patting him once on the back of the hand before releasing it and stepping away.

"Cid's here, too," She crossed her arms and tossed her hair back and he was utterly entranced. "Shera's with the kids."

"Speaking of, why don't ya go call the little brats," a voice drawled from the doorway. "Since Sleeping goddamn Beauty decided to grace us with his presence and all."

Cid was lounging against the doorframe with a carefully blank expression. Tifa stood.

"I should. I'll be right back, okay?" She left, taking all the light with her, and he and Cid were alone in drab white room. The pilot carefully shut the door after her, paced a few moments while his fingers fumbled for a cigarette, noticed the "Thank You For Not Smoking" sign, cursed under his breath, and finally came to a rest in the center of the room, at the foot of the bed. The low, cold evening light of midwinter slanted behind him, illuminating a vase of slightly wilted flowers – Tifa's doing or a sad, industrial attempt at cheer, he couldn't tell.

"So where the goddamn hell have you been, Valentine?" he asked.

Vincent looked away. "Here."

"Before here."

"Tifa must have told you."

"Fuckin' _humor_ me."

"I was in Nibelheim."

"_Where_ in Nibelheim?" The set to his jaw indicated that Cid was going to drag it out of him come hell or high water.

"In the mansion. Atoning." It sounded entirely too small – some quality of the room, absorbing sound.

"God_dammit_, Vincent!" A gloved fist came down on the rail and Vincent felt the reverberations. "You said you weren't gonna do that shit!"

_"I am not running, Cid."_

_"Yeah, sure," The older man took a long drag on his cigarette. "Listen, I know __somethin's__ spooked __ya__, but we can, you know, talk about it or some shit. It doesn't have to be this way."_

_He had dreamed the night before of the mansion, of his coffin gaping like an infected wound and high-pitched laughter, mad and swirling and dragging him down and woken with a terrible peace, a desperate longing. _

_They had been so kind, that was it – kind and considerate and ever-so-careful not to mention what he was, what he would always _be_ – a monster. The longer he stayed in the light the worse the collateral damage would be when the darkness came for its own._

_"I promise I am not running."_

_"You're just __goin__' back to that __fuckin__' haunted house. Vince – __dammit__, Vince, __look__ at me!" _

_Startled, he looked up and met Cid's eyes._

_"Just promise me you won't go back there. '__Sall__ I ask."_

_And the worry and understanding and rough, desperate love had been too much; he had nodded, too quickly, and deliberately not run into in the welcoming night._

"I'm sorry – "

"Sorry don't fuckin' cover it!" Cid was pacing furiously now, spinning at each wall like a top. "You break your goddamn promise and I don't hear a fuckin' word from you for a year, I see you goddamn _hiding_ from me when I come to see if you're doin' alright, next thing I know I got a hysterical teenager on the phone tellin' me you're in the fuckin' hospital and find out you've been living with Tifa for fuckin' months and all you can damn well say for yourself is you're _sorry?_"

"I am. For all of it." Guilt pressed down on him, an old friend, and he almost sighed at the familiarity.

"You're a goddamn asshole, Vince, you know that?" He grabbed a chair and spun it around, settling in it backwards. "Now, did it just not occur ta you that I might appreciate a goddamn postcard when you decided to rejoin society or is this your way of tellin' me to get lost?"

"I kissed her," Vincent said, and snapped his mouth shut in shock. Cid reached behind him and took a swig from the dregs of one of the plastic coffee cups littering the table, grimacing when it turned out to be cold. A nurse peered worriedly through the large window in the door and then turned away, chatting idly with a passing security guard.

"Who?"

"Tifa."

"The _fuck?_ By all that's fuckin' holy, if this is some kinda dramatic emo _shit_ you're pulling…"

"I took the aspirin and next thing I knew…"

They both stopped, aware they had been speaking over each other.

"What do you mean?"

"Dunno, what the hell do I mean? You kiss her, she's not with you far as I fuckin' know, next thing you're in the hospital…"

"Cid." Vincent sighed, and would have laughed if the man hadn't seemed almost serious. "If I were going to kill myself, I would have done it long ago. And why would I poison myself when I have guns?"

Cid gestured irritably. "Kill a guy for worrying. Now deign to fucking _inform_ me. Asshole." The last was muttered.

He outlined the story so far as quickly as he could, a peculiar relief creeping over him. It wasn't that he expected Cid to be of any help – but something about the act of sharing it, of confessing his confusion and desire and yes, _love_, terrible on-your-knees, tear-your-heart-out love – it lessened the burden. As he told it, he found himself watching Cid's reactions: mild confusion, shock, and finally a cool understanding.

Cid swore.

"You don't fuck up halfway, do ya?"

"I didn't mean for it to get this far. I thought – "

"Ya fuckin' liar. Unless you meant you were thinkin' with the other damn head."

Vincent looked away, heat rising in his face. "That was uncalled for."

"Very goddamn called for. You know why none of us ever come 'round? 'Cause she doesn't fuckin' _talk_ to us anymore. Just finds something she thinks we're after and gives it over and then won't let us give any-goddamn-thing _back_ – "

"Did any of you ever _try?_" Anger – pure and hot and irrational – surged through him and left the underside of his mind roaring in triumph as a band around his heart tightened and white crept in the corner of his vision.

"Fuck yes! You're not the only goddamn person on the planet who cares about her, Vince!" Cid stood again, propelled by frustration. "She wouldn't let us in – fucked if I know what you did to get past her, but ya did, and all I'm sayin' is you better be goddamn one hundred per-fucking-cent _sure_ this is real."

"What?" Confusion loosened the tightness in his chest and left him drifting on a wave of adrenaline.

"Means if you break her heart I'll fuckin' break every bone in your body, even if ya are my friend. Know for a goddamn fact the others'll help."

Vincent knew he was gaping and couldn't seem to stop; the entire conversation had suddenly shifted gears and left him flailing, certain he was missing some vital piece of information.

"Cloud came by a couple weeks after he left for good," Cid said, casually as if discussing the weather.

…there it was. "I see." He tilted his head slightly. "And…?"

"He didn't get any damn sympathy from me. Boy needs to get his head on straight. Wasn't too hard on him, though." Vincent thought he did a good job of controlling his disappointment; Cid snorted at him and shook his head. "Damn overprotective spook. Cloud's been pretty fucked over by the whole thing – not gonna blame him for wanting some time to himself. Could have done it with a little more fucking finesse, though, you know?"

"He made her cry," was all Vincent could bring himself to say, and grimaced immediately. "That was juvenile."

"So did you," Cid said: then his eyes widened. "Shit, sorry."

"…she cried?"

"'Course she fuckin' cried. You scared her half to death. She got over it. My point _is_, are you sure?"

"Sure of what?"

"That you love her, asshole."

Vincent looked away again. "How is one supposed to know?"

"Well… 'bout the time I was finishing the plans for the new airship, came time to name her. Was gonna name her the _Highwind_, like every goddamn thing I've ever driven, and my pop, and granddad, and so on back to the fuckin' dawn of time. Then I went to make it official and the only name I could think of was goddamn Shera. Figure that was when I knew."

"Congratulations," he said dryly. "When's the wedding?"

"Few months. We don't have a date set yet." Vincent choked. "Ha! Didn't know I had it in me, did ya? Next time, fuckin' write or call or somethin' or you'll miss all this important shit."

For a moment he struggled valiantly to conceive of Cid as a married man and failed. Then again, it was no more absurd than the idea that he would end up working as Tifa's bookkeeper and fighting the urge to damn himself by taking her in his arms and…

"Amazing, the places you end up," he murmured. And then began to chuckle, and then to laugh, helpless before the sheer absurd _pointlessness_ of it all. Cid stared at him, doubtless wondering if he should call the psych ward, then began to smirk and started cackling himself, pounding his fist against the railing at the foot of the bed. Vincent clutched his side with his good hand, tears streaming down his face: because really, what else was there to do?

Which was when Tifa came in, shutting her phone. "Marlene and Denzel want to see you – well, Marlene does, Denzel is just… what's so funny?"

He tried to gesture, to indicate that it was the whole damn _universe_, pardon his language, and couldn't quite do it. But the laughter was infectious – a draining of tension – and she began to smile, and giggle, and finally the three of them were standing in a rough triangle, laughing for no reason at all.

They stopped eventually, abruptly, wrapped in a false calm. Nothing had really been resolved, he knew in his bones, but for the moment, just for now, they could pretend. Cid stood awkwardly, stretching.

"Think I'll go wait outside. Need a smoke." Then he left, and Tifa took her seat next to him.

"How are you feeling?"

"Alright, I suppose."

"Cid brought some of your things from home." She reached down and pulled up a duffel bag from under the bed, setting it carefully between them. "Um… should I… the doctors said they'd give your gauntlet back. Maybe I should go check – "

His functional hand disobeyed a direct order and grasped the crook of her arm.

"Open it, please."

She met his eyes; his breath caught; then she nodded and unzipped the duffel. The first thing she pulled out was a worn stuffed bear with mismatched eyes.

"…Captain Wrinkles?"

"Marlene. Of course" He took the toy from her and rested it against his pillow, patting it once on the head. "Captain Wrinkles should be treated with the respect due to his station in life," he said blandly, and his heart did a backflip when she smiled in response.

"She's really started to look up to you. I mean – Barret tries, but he's… he still blames himself."

"And she is a living symbol of his failure." He leaned back.

"I suppose you'd understand." A wry grin tugged at the corner of her mouth. Oh, he understood: guilt was a canker, gnawing at your heart and tossing it away like an old apple core when there was nothing left to chew on.

Luckily he'd always been a fast healer.

"Would you like to change?" she said, pushing the duffel slightly towards him. "The hospital gown can't be that comfortable."

"I hadn't really noticed." True enough, between the shock of waking and the… discussion… with Cid. She raised an eyebrow at him and he raised one back, daring her to comment. Tifa smiled at him – there went his heart again – and patted him once on his good hand before standing.

"I'll be outside. Call when you've changed."

She pulled a curtain over the observation window before leaving, oblivious to the indignant glare from the nurses, and he could hear muffled voices arguing from outside the door. Quickly – before the hospital could win and force the window open again – he levered himself off the bad, gimp arm and all, and maneuvered himself into his clothing. The shirt Shera had packed wasn't exactly clean; not her fault. He did his own laundry, so he'd never really mastered the fine art of getting it in the hamper. There was a small brownish stain, hidden by the collar; the shirt was a deep rusted red, so it was fairly hard to see. Half-asleep, exhausted by the quick trip, worried, she wouldn't have noticed…

…but he did, and he remembered how the shirt had gotten that stain to begin with. A bit of morning horseplay – she was always groggy before her coffee and even though it was a little mean – to be honest, _because _it was a little mean – that was when he teased her the most, in the quiet hours they had to themselves in the late morning when the sun flooded the room, after the children had gone to school and before the bar opened. Just the other day, irritated beyond endurance, she'd dipped her hand in the dirty water as she cleaned out a pot and tossed it right at his face.

_He spluttered and wiped at his mouth, pulling a face at the bitter, soapy taste filming his tongue. She was immediately contrite, eyes wide, hand at her mouth, gasping apologies and handing over a dishtowel as he groped for one to wipe his face with._

_When he could see again she was still staring at him, shaking slightly, and he groped a moment for words to reassure her – he had deserved it, after all, and it wasn't as if he was hurt – before he realized she was holding in a terrible case of the giggles. She looked up, saw his indignant face and couldn't hold it in any longer; she dissolved, clutching her stomach and snickering and in that moment – with the sunlight shining off her dark hair and tears of laughter shining in her eyes – even though she was a black-hearted wench who'd just tossed disgusting soapy dishwater in his face – she was certain to be the death of him and he loved her more than anything._

_In that moment he wanted desperately to kiss her, dishwater and all._

_She met his eyes and her laughter trailed off, stifled under the weight of his regard. He reached out – to brush an errant strand of hair from her face, he told himself, knowing it would become a caress, knowing next he would lean into her, draw her close and wrap himself in her, knowing all this and still letting it happen – and her eyes slid closed as she leaned forward just a bit…_

_…when the damn cat started __yacking__ on the carpet._

_The moment, obviously, was broken, and a substantial number of moment afterwards were devoted to figuring out exactly why the almost supernaturally healthy beast had chosen that particular moment to sick all over the rug (he suspected the creature's naturally perverse temperament), but he had not forgotten – for a moment, he had almost kissed her and she…_

_She had almost let him_.

And when he had finally kissed her, she had run away. Why?

A shudder passed through him and he forced the shirt over his head, grimacing as he maneuvered his dead arm down one of the sleeves. He'd grown more or less accustomed to the dead limb over the past few months, learned to compensate and work his way around with only one arm. Even though he didn't seem to sweat anymore, there was a certain comfort in maintaining the rituals – an illusion of normalcy to hold onto and build off from as he felt his way back into something like a regular life.

Someone knocked on his door.

"Vincent? Are you dressed?"

"Come in," he said, tugging one sleeve down to cover the shriveled claw of his left hand. He was used to it, but as far as he knew until last night Tifa had never seen it. There was no particular reason why she should keep seeing it, either.

When she came in, she had his gauntlet under one arm.

"I finally got it back from the doctors. They want you to come back, you know, for a proper examination. I guess they didn't see enough when they had you in ER." There was enough irritation in her voice that he could guess at exactly how the doctors had asked, and shook his head.

"No. No tests. Ever." He turned away slightly and began fumbling to roll up his left sleeve; the gauntlet couldn't go on over cloth. She saw him working at it and before he could protest – before he could even react – she was at his side, deft fingers rolling up the cloth.

"I really should hem these off for you." She stopped where the flesh became clean again, a little ways past his elbow. "There, that's where you usually have it, right?"

He could only nod, all the breath gone from his lungs. It wasn't that he had been able to feel her – his left arm, without his gauntlet, was so much meat – so much as her sheer audacity, her fearlessness in the face of his deformity. She took up the gauntlet from where she'd set it down on the bed and offered it to him; he took it and slowly slid his arm in, pressing almost invisible buttons as he did so and grimacing slightly at the initial twinge as dead nerves connected to living circuitry. One final twist of the collar above his elbow, a brief flare of agonizing pain as his mechanical arm roared into life, and the familiar dull weight of the metal took its place at his left side.

"Does it hurt?' She reddened slightly. "Not that it's any of my business, I mean, you just looked like it did."

"A little," he admitted, smoothing the sleeve to avoid looking at her. "Only at first."

It seemed for a moment that there was more she wanted to say, but the noise of someone running pell-mell towards the room, accompanied by a worried call, made them turn. Marlene barreled into the room, followed shortly by Shera, Cid, and Denzel (slouching and resentful as always, staring at the ground as though it held the secrets of the universe).

"You're not dead!" she cried, and promptly attached herself to his leg. He sat down on the bed and she climbed up to hug him properly.

"What made you think I would be?"

"I was _scared_ you would be." The girl looked up at him for a second, accusing green eyes focused on his. "You shouldn't scare people, Vincent."

"I apologize. I didn't intend to."

She settled down on his lap, one hand fisted in the cloth of his shirt, and seemed quite content to stay there. Denzel stumbled slightly, and Vincent saw Cid tuck one arm behind his back and look off in the other direction, all but whistling a jaunty tune as the teenager stepped forward and offered his hand.

"You're okay?"

"Quite."

Cid cleared his throat idly and Denzel thrust out his hand. Vincent grasped it solemnly. "'M glad," he muttered.

"How are you feeling, Vincent?" Shera asked, taking the chair at the bedside. Tifa sat down next to him – close enough that he could feel her breathing – and crossed her legs… her long, muscular, shapely legs…

"Vincent?" Shera was looking quizzically at him and he shook his head slightly. Cid smirked at him and he ignored the man.

"Better. I'd like to get out of here, though."

"I'm afraid we can't let you go quite yet, Mr. Valentine." He snapped his head towards the doorway and had to stop himself from glowering at the woman standing there in a white lab coat and jeans, black hair pulled back in a tight, sensible bun. "I'm Dr. Lowebsky. Ms. Lockhart might have mentioned me…?"

Tifa looked suddenly abashed and Vincent shook his head.

"Well. Anyway. As far as we can tell, your immune system is inhumanly sensitive –enough so that it reacts to almost any foreign substance as if it were an invader. It's also exceptionally strong, which is why you reacted as though you had been poisoned."

"…but I still eat, and drink."

The doctor reddened slightly. "We're… not entirely sure how it works. You heal exceptionally fast; while you were briefly in surgery, before we realized what was wrong, it was all we could do to keep the incisions open – "

He frowned a little bit at her enthusiasm and she flushed, coming back from whatever academic high she'd been on.

"Whatever was done to you – whoever did it – they were a genius. I've never encountered anything like it."

"No," A certain grim humor welled up and tinged his voice. "I'm sure you haven't."

"Which is why we – the hospital – would like you to come in at some later date for further testing. You could be holding the key to enormous strides in medical science – "

"No," he said shortly. "No tests. I'm sorry, doctor."

She looked taken aback and fiddled with her glasses a bit, shifting her clipboard so that it was held in front of her.

"Mr. Valentine, I really must insist that you consider it. Your immune system – "

"_No_." She stepped back; he pinched the bridge of his nose and forced a sudden surge of rage under control. "Please, doctor. No tests."

"…if you're sure." Her eyes condemned him; well, let her think what she wanted. He hardly owed her an explanation. "You are, however, going to have to stay one more night for observation, to make sure the drug has entirely left your system."

Vincent closed his eyes, praying that wasn't the dull throb of another headache building behind his eyes; he had forgotten he'd been prone to them, back in the world. And now he couldn't even take aspirin… damned lunatic scientist had probably done it on purpose.

He didn't want to spend another night at the hospital. What he wanted was to go home – to the kitchen and the small living room, his room and his books and the children. And Tifa. And even that _damn_ cat.

A warm, calloused hand slid into his. "I'll stay with you," Tifa said.

"Fine, then." His voice was quiet and Marlene pressed herself a little closer, sensing the change in the air. "One more night."

* * *

Rain began to fall shortly after sunset, streaking the window and distorting the halogen light of the street outside. The hospital grew still and quiet; he fancied he could feel the place shutting down and slowing, an antiseptic behemoth settling into slumber. Nothing but fancy, he knew – portions of the hospital never slept, since people persisted in getting sick and injured when and where they chose, instead of during business hours. 

Tifa had gone home briefly to shower and change her clothing: now with damp hair, still smelling of soap and clean water, she was wrestling with the other end of a cot she'd sweet-talked out of some nurses. He had the other end, and a pillow and blanket were sitting on the sickbed.

"You don't have to stay."

She yawned hugely and shot him what he'd come to think of as her resolve-grin – the one that said she'd already made up her mind, and no amount of logic or emotional appeal would sway her. "I know I don't have to. I still am."

"You would sleep more soundly in your own bed."

"Would you feel better if I left you with Captain Wrinkles?" Her gaze was direct and uncomfortably knowing; the lights in the hallway chose that moment to dim and he flinched a little, accosted by a vision of a long, lonely night in this death-smelling place, haunted by memories.

"I didn't think so," she said without triumph, and walked past him to get her pillow and blanket. He grabbed her elbow as she passed.

"Tifa. You do not need to care for me." She deserved to have one person who didn't depend on her. He _did_ depend on her – would lay every last ragged scrap of worth and self and pride he could find in himself before her, if it would keep her in his life, _near_ him – but he had not take up her banner to obligate her further.

Her hand came up to press briefly against his cheek. "I know," she said simply, disengaging and grabbing the bed fixings. "I don't mind. And you've done so much, these past months…"

"It was my pleasure."

She made up the cot, smoothing the blanket absently. "And it's mine to stay and keep you company." Another grin, meant to reassure this time, interrupted by another yawn. "Only I won't be very good company, I'm afraid. I'm beat."

She sat down on the edge of the cot and began to pull off her boots, tugging at the lacings and eventually just forcing them off. Awkwardness sang through him and he stayed exactly where he was, entertaining for a moment the irrational notion that she would begin disrobing right in front of him.

He was almost disappointed when she lay down, still in her clothes, and pulled the blanket up. "You should get to sleep, too. The sooner you do, the sooner you'll wake up, and the sooner we can go home."

Childish logic. Accurate, too. Only there was no way in hell he was stripping down to his boxers with her in the room – well, what he was wearing now was rather more comfortable than the leather-and-belts ensemble from his AVALANCHE days, and the hospital bed, for all its stiffness, was still softer than the ground. Or his coffin.

He turned off the lights and got into bed, not bothering to take off the gauntlet. There was very little chance he'd get any sleep at all, even with Tifa's steady breathing reminding him that this was not the lab under the mansion and he was not awaiting another painful round of surgeries, strapped tightly to the slab with an IV drip keeping him too groggy to fight back…

Vincent closed his eyes and breathed carefully, evenly, forcing his mind away from darkness. It had become surprisingly easy to do over the past few months; his newest memories were untainted, without regret or the bittersweet knowledge of what had come after.

So he made himself think about his life (what a strange idea _that_ was) – to fret over Marlene's upcoming math test and Denzel's history final, to ponder financial strategies for the bar, to wonder if George knew what had happened and how he was taking it. H was surprisingly educated, though vague about his past. When the nights were slow and the paperwork was done early he had taken to sitting at the bar, just to keep Tifa company, and the big man would join them more often than not, fumbling for words and eventually resorting to quoting in a soft, measured voice.

Marlene and the cat, after some mistrust on the beast's part, had become fast friends. It slept curled next to her pillow at night, wandered during the day, and always made sure to come home in time to beg attention from Marlene as she did her homework. Couldn't even spare a glance for him these days, traitorous fuzzball.

Denzel was… Denzel was slowly resigning himself to the situation. Vincent was fairly sure it wasn't that the young man disliked him so much as he didn't _want_ to like him; he'd convinced himself that if he could just wait and believe, Cloud would return, and everything would be as it was supposed to be. There was nothing to be done about that, except to watch his boundaries.

He sighed and closed his eyes.

There was a power to these mundane thoughts of grocery lists and accounting and interpersonal relationships. They drove off the darkness when it beat around the edges of his mind, threatening to plunge him back into guilt and grief and yes, a little bit of madness. Apparently even the most persistent of ghosts retreated in the face of the comfortable solidity of day-to-day life and the knowledge that when he woke in the morning everything would be as it was yesterday, and _she_ would be there, smiling and teasing and pulling him forward.

He opened his eyes again and rolled over, wanting to look at her. His night vision was exceptional these days – one of Hojo's little improvements – and he saw her shivering slightly under the thin blanket.

"Tifa?"

"Mmm?" She turned to face him across the room. "Something wrong?"

"Are you cold?"

"A little. I think they turn the heat down at night."

"Would you like my blanket?"

"Then you'll be cold."

"I will not feel it." He sat up and began tugging at the blanket, gathering it in his arms.

"Vincent, really, it's okay."

"What good does it do if you're sick just after I've recovered?" She was also sitting up now, and making various it's-not-necessary gestures. He swung himself out of bed, trailing bits of blanket, and went over to her anyway.

"I'm _fine_, honestly. You're the one who's been sick, for heaven's sake."

"I'm much better. You're being irrational."

"I'll throw it off, I swear."

He examined her for a long moment in the darkness – her jaw was set, and her eyes clear and determined. So. It was going to be like _that_. Not missing a beat, he went back over to the hospital bed, spread the blanket back over it, turned back to the cot, whipped off her blanket, and lay it on top of the other one. She spluttered. He ignored her.

"I can also be unreasonable," he said, and lifted her off the cot. She shoved peevishly at his shoulder as he carried her over to the bed and set her down, gently. Echoes of months before. Only he was a bit bolder now, and felt just a smidge entitled to some indulgence after the past day or so.

"What on earth are you doing?"

"We'll share," was all he said as he sat down on the other side of the bed, taking off his gauntlet lest he cut her by accident in the night. She was staring at him.

"And what if I just take my blanket and go back to the cot?"

"Then I will have to do this all over again. Not very productive."

"…I really don't understand you, sometimes." The mattress shifted as she lay down and he smirked slightly. "Stubborn old Turk."

"Ex-Turk," he reminded her primly, and put the gauntlet on the bedside table before lying down next to her. The he sat up again.

"Pillow. Knew I forgot something."

The pillow from her cot acquired, he tucked himself back into bed and draped his good arm around her waist unthinkingly. Her shirt had ridden up slightly; her bare skin was under his bare fingers, warm and soft and he could swear he felt her heart. Was there a major artery near the waist? He couldn't quite recall. His world had shrunk to Tifa, his Tifa, and her warmth and skin and scent. She still hadn't told him what the bandage on her shoulder was about, though he had any idea from the memories fading in and out – broken images, flashes of emotion – a surge of _mine_, and copper-salt on his tongue.

His Tifa. When had she become _his_ Tifa? More accurately, when had he become, irrevocably, _hers_? He'd taken such pains to guard his heart and she'd still crept in, shining in the center of it so that he could no longer imagine a world without her bright presence in the corner of his mind, a lodestone for his poor wandering soul.

A new thought crept forward from the back spaces. Was he betraying his past? He hadn't meant to. Only she was so irresistibly _real_ against the darkness, reaching out even when the stink of fear betrayed her urge to run.

She murmured a little, half-asleep, and turned over. Her head fit perfectly under his chin; his hand was resting at the small of her back and he fought the urge to pull her flush against him. His thoughts grew slow and drowsy, intoxicated by her nearness.

Why had she pressed against him only to run away? When she reached for him in the darkness…

"Vincent?" she murmured.

"Hmm?"

"'m sorry."

"What for?"

"…shouldn't have pushed you away like that. You didn't know…"

"Know?"

"…just didn't want to pretend again." One hand crept up and tangled in his shirt. "Cloud didn't see me. I didn't want…"

_"I can't. Not again. I'm __sorry," she'd said, walking away with tears in her eyes and he__'d cursed himself for a fool, thinking it had to be him, and ignoring what she actually __sai__d__…_

"…didn't want to lie to you," she said finally. He lay in silence for a moment, sure she could feel his heart thudding in his chest.

_Not again, _she'd said.

"…Vincent?" Her voice was small and sad; he pressed a chaste kiss against her forehead.

"It's alright. Go to sleep."

She snuggled into the pillow, like a child, and soon he felt and heard her breathing deepen and even. He did not sleep that night: shocked into a watchful patience, he twined his fingers in her hair and thought, long and hard, until he found a solution.


	8. Epilogue

_What about now – forget about tomorrow, it's too far away  
What about now – don't talk of yesterday, it's too far away  
I'm coming out of these __shadows,__ I'm getting off of this one-way street  
Blue memories, they just gather dust  
__Leave '__em__ in the rain, they turn into rust_

"What About Now," Robbie Robertson

It was a few days later that he reminded her they still hadn't discussed anything she'd said they would – the kiss, and the warped panicked moments leading up to the ambulance and the hospital. She flushed and turned away, hands clenching and unclenching around the dishtowel.

"…can't we just forget about it? I sound like such a coward, but I… I want things… I'm tired of wanting what I can't have."

"As am I." His voice was still and even, the monotone he'd almost forgotten. Inside he was lurching, grabbing at straws and almost nauseous with the enormity of it all. "Tifa."

Her name tasted like long summer evenings. He took a step closer, deliberately invading her space, breaking the fragile détente again. "Keep your eyes open?"

Then she was in his arms, oranges and smoke and strawberry lipgloss. He saw her eyes flutter shut and pulled away for a second to murmur an admonition; they slowly opened again and fixed on his as he kissed her with all the delicacy he could muster, nerves singing under her hands braced on his forearms for balance. Bewildered at first, then apprehensive, then finally, blessedly understanding.

He couldn't breathe and had to break the kiss, sucking cool air into tortured lungs.

"Only you." When had he decided to speak? "Only ever you," and he pressed his mouth against the crown of her head.

She was still, but didn't push him away.

"…oh. I see. I…" A step back. He let her go, _yearning_. "I… oh dear. Why did things have to get so _complicated?_" She gnawed on her thumbnail anxiously, hugging herself.

"I didn't exactly plan this," he half-lied.

"I know. Can't… I need to think."

"Is it me?"

"No. I mean, more – what if it _is_ you? I mean, really _you_. Who I – " She fell silent and he took a step away, as content as he could be; at least now she _knew_, and he could choke back the frustration. Somehow.

"Yes. Think about it. As much as you need to." No anger there, no impatience, only a dreadful honesty. "I will be here." He had waited this long, already.

And he was.

A year passed.

The door to Seventh Heaven swung open. Tifa didn't look up from where she had been propped on one elbow, nailing the new bar into place.

"Sorry, we're closed."

"Should I come back later, then?" A dark tenor, half-laughing, heartbreakingly familiar and she had to look up, knowing it was impossible because no one had heard a word from him since… since…

Very carefully, she put the hammer down. She would not let it fall from her hands. She was not one of those fainting girls in the horrible romances Marlene had taken to reading. She was… she was…

She was going to _kill_ him.

"Cloud?" was all she could rasp out, hoarse with shock.

"It's been a while." He paused on the threshold, fingers wrapped around the doorframe. "Can I come in?" _Am I still welcome?_

Tifa stood, not bracing herself in any way whatsoever on the new bar. The old one had been destroyed the other night – a drunken brawl, nothing special except that one of the fighters had made the mistake of swinging at her when she went to break it up. It had been so long she had half-forgotten her own strength.

"Where have you been?" An absent gesture. _Come in_.

"Here and there. Nowhere."

She found herself sitting in one of the booths across from him almost like a memory, or the dreams she used to have.

"What were you doing?"

"Thinking. Things I should have done to begin with." Gods, he'd barely aged a day. "Where are the kids?"

She realized the silence had ached too long and shook her head to clear it. "Oh! Um, with Vincent," she said, suddenly shy. "There's a carnival – I'd be there too, only…" she gestured at the new furniture.

"Vincent?"

It took a moment before she realized he wouldn't know and another moment to be shocked at how casual the thought felt. Vincent was with the kids, making sure they didn't eat anything too suspicious or spend all their allowances, enduring the noise and crowd and lights with a slightly pained half-smile because hell, they were having fun. He would come back at the end of the day, holding Marlene's hand with Denzel trailing behind or ahead (too old to cling and too young yet to walk besides). The kids would go off to bed (not that Denzel seemed to get any proper sleep anymore), they would talk a little and go to their separate rooms. He didn't spend the early night in her room anymore – she could sense him through the walls. Morning would come, and he would still be there.

"He's been living with – he's been living here for a while now."

"How long?" There was a pained quality in his voice, a sudden slow blossom of understanding as he read her eyes.

"Since a few months after you left… why?"

His lips tilted in something too filled with irony and regret to be called a smile. "Guess I'm too late, then."

Not a question.

"Too late?"

"I'd thought – I'd hoped – maybe you'd…"

"…oh?" and then: "Oh!" Her eyes widened. A moment grew between them, ripe with possibilities.

She realized – wondering, resigned, bewildered, half-expecting it – that it simply wasn't in her anymore.

He shook his head, no malice in his eyes. "Figures."

The moment died when he turned to leave so she shot up. "Wait! You can't leave – the kids – you just _got_ here!"

"I'll be back tomorrow." He didn't turn around. "I promise."

"…right. Right. Sure." Open bitterness for the first time, and he winced. Then he thought of something and dug in his pocket. The keys jangled as he lay them on the new bar.

"I'm staying at an inn," he said to the question he knew was on her lips. "Walked here. These are the keys for Fenrir."

He looked back over his shoulder and met her eyes. There was love there, yes – love had always sung between them, would tie them together until the end. There was also regret, and scarred-over pain, and memory and loss and in that moment they saw each other truly.

She smiled, brilliant and unafraid. "You'll be back tomorrow."

He smiled back.

* * *

She was playing with the keys at the bar, the day's mess still scattered around her, when Vincent came back as she had known he would – behind Denzel, who clutching his stomach and groaning, holding Marlene's hand. She looked quite perky and clutched an enormous stuffed… something. Tifa took it in for a moment and her heart gave a strange little twitch at how completely he seemed to belong, gauntlet and all. 

"Was it the funnel cake or the tilt-a-whirl?" Tifa asked.

"I suspect the hot dogs, actually. I warned you," he told the miserable teenager.

Denzel glared at him and stalked up the stairs to his bedroom. The door slammed behind him.

"I am sure I was never that ill-mannered as a teenager," Vincent muttered. There was an unmistakable look of relief in his eyes and he winced slightly as she watched, letting go of Marlene's hand to press his to his temple briefly.

"I think it's almost bedtime for you, Marlene." Tifa slid off the barstool, bracing for the slow process of chivvying the girl to bed; to her surprise, all Marlene did was tug at Vincent's shirt and peck him on the cheek when he knelt.

"Thank you for winning me the moogle toy," she said, solving the mystery of what the giant plushie was supposed to be, and vanished up the stairs. Tifa watched her go, then turned back to Vincent.

"So what was it that did you in?"

"Is it that obvious?"

"Maybe just to me." He blinked at the roundabout admission of how close they'd become. "Give me second down here? I was just taking a break before cleaning up."

"You have installed the new bar?"

"Yes. There will be no banging."

"Ah. Good. I will just go lie down for a while." He also vanished into the living quarters above the bar, rubbing distractedly at his temple. She slid the keys in her pocket and began to clean up, wondering how best to go about things now, in the wake of her new understanding.

Cleaning up didn't take long. The shadows were dimming into darkness broken by streetlights when she followed her family upstairs to their home; she paused a moment before her bedroom door, blinking away habit, then turned and opened Vincent's. He was lying on his bed with the curtain closed and a wet cloth over his eyes.

She glided over to him in her stocking feet and sat down on the edge of the bed. He made a quizzical noise and she smiled though he couldn't see her, starting to run her fingers through his hair.

"…that feels nice," he murmured, half-asleep, a goofy smile twitching the corners of his mouth. "What did I do to deserve it?"

"Everything. But I have some news."

"Must be bad, then."

"Well, I don't think it is." Insecurity scrabbled at the corner of her mind and leaked into her voice.

"Spare my aching head the mystery, if you please."

"Cloud came by today." He sat up, instantly grave, and she pressed a finger against his lips; he stayed silent, bewildered by her sudden intimacy. "I'm not done. He was just here for a few seconds – he's coming back tomorrow, he left his keys, and I suppose we'll really sort things out then. But I realized something."

"Tifa, you don't have to do this." He drew back, knowing what was coming and retreating in advance of the storm.

"Do what?"

"This… there was never a promise between us. I always knew – if he should come back, to stay – the odds…"

She couldn't help laughing a little. He took the cloth off his eyes and just looked at her, bruised by her mirth and gentle smile and searching desperately for some reaction – this was inexpressibly, impossibly cruel.

Which was when she kissed him. Swift, almost shy, but definitely a kiss, and when she was done her fingers rested lightly on his cheek and scant inches separated them.

"What was I was going to say is I realized that I… well, I _do_ love him. And if he wants to be part of my life, of the children's lives, he's welcome. Only he'd have to be part of your life, too, because when I think of all that, you're always there. Not on the sides. In the heart of it."

She pressed her forehead to his, suddenly afraid to meet his eyes. "What I'm trying to say is, I… love you. And I'm _in_ love with you, too. And… well, that's it." Her hand dropped down and squeezed his before she sat back, waiting for his response.

He stared, fireworks and white noise going off in his brain, and wondered if she would be offended if he asked her to pinch him. The seconds ticked by unbroken and she fidgeted, half-afraid she had been too late after all, and come to love him just after he'd let her go.

After an eternity, he reached out and brushed a strand of errant hair from her face as he had uncounted times before. This time he let his hand linger, sliding gently down the side of her face, a little ways into her hair before cupping the back of her neck. She closed her eyes, shivering, then opened them again. He'd tilted his head slightly.

"Thank you," he whispered hoarsely, and they met in the space between. It was slow and unhurried, an exploration and a gift, going on forever without air, a blur of lips and hands and skin and deep, steady breathing. When it ended they were on the bed together, him on his back and she on top of him, gazing at him with hooded eyes.

"What about your headache?" she murmured, teasing as her hand wandered down his body, lower, until she reached the waistband of the sweatpants he'd changed into and then slid _under_…

"Miraculously cured," he had just enough breath to gasp before they surrendered, together, and flew.

* * *

They lay twined together, after, pleasantly unsure as to where one body ended and the other began. He'd had his face buried in her neck for the past few moments and seemed quite content to stay there; she'd discovered that she liked him that way, the weight and the solidity of him. It had been a bit awkward at first, one-armed that he was, but then… 

She hid her smile in the curve of his shoulder and sought out his hand. It was frustratingly out of reach so she nudged at him, ignoring his protests, until he rolled over and she could snuggle against him properly. He didn't respond when she curled her hand around his under the covers; puzzled, she looked and they realized at the same time she'd taken the dead one, the one he'd remembered to hold away from her even as they'd forgotten everything else.

He twitched away from her and she didn't let go, bringing it up from under the covers and kissing the palm.

"It doesn't upset me, Vincent."

"It upsets _me_." She let go and he pulled his shoulder back, wincing as it flopped down his side. "Dammit."

Without a word, she crawled over him and settled on the opposite side of the bed. He turned to follow her, adjusting his bad arm, and wrapped his good one around her.

"Clever."

"One of us has to be."

He raised an eyebrow. "And I suppose I'm the one who'll have to get a lobotomy?"

"Wouldn't you rather have a bottle in front of you? Since I run a bar and all."

He glared and she dissolved into giggles. "If I'd know you got this silly…" It only made her laugh harder and seeing no alternative, he kissed her warmly with open eyes and gloried in the love he saw there.

"What would you have done?" she asked sleepily when they broke off, nestling her head against his shoulder.

"Hmm?"

"If you'd known I would be this silly."

"Gagged you," he said promptly, and braced himself for the smack. She snickered instead.

"Kinky. Ball or cleave?"

"How on _earth_ do you know that?"

"How do you?"

"Good point." He smiled to himself and shifted to lie on his back, closing his eyes as his thoughts drifted farther apart and sleep beckoned. She followed, still resting her head on his shoulder. "I don't usually break out the whips and chains until the fourth or fifth date, but in this case…"

"We skipped so many of the preliminaries, after all."

"Do you regret it?" he said around a yawn.

"Nope." She kissed his shoulder idly, playing with his hair. "Go to sleep."

Her only response was a rumble, and she realized he already had. Tifa yawned hugely, knowing she was tired and still not quite wanting to give in – wanting to remember this moment, with this man, in case it never came again.

Though that was silly, she realized as soon as she thought it. Of course it would come again – not in this exact form – but it would come, again and again. In that moment she saw the future stretching ahead of her, an endless series of moments with _this man_, in this place, with family and with friends, in a long-earned peace.

Her eyes slid closed and she let herself fall. Outside the noise of the city swirled and settled into its quieter nighttime rhythm, light and life turning inwards in comfort behind closed doors until morning. The stars danced, the clouds drifted, and the moon gazed warmly down while the planet held its breath, waiting for the new day.

* * *

Extended Author's Notes:

Well, I am less than happy with the last two chapters - I always feel like my writing's gone to shit when I have to move plot - but I tweaked and tweaked and finally gave up. Hopefully the epilogue makes up for it, though it lacks sex.

I do have another fic in the works, which will be titled Jenova Cooties and involve, among other things, wet dreams, telepathy, haunted houses, and creepy alien parasites. It's supposed to be horror/humour/romance - think Shaun of the Dead, but Lovecraft instead of zombies. Let's see if I can pull it off. VinTi, of course.

Looking over this fic, there's quite a bit I'd do differently, but we live and learn. Etc. I hope you enjoyed this little foray.

Onwards and upwards, always

Ayezur E. Draca, Commander of the Pillowfort.

P.S. Ah, I almost forgot. Rach was the one who pointed me towards the Wintersleep song, and she was introduced to that band by Ms. Tijuana Pirate, loveliest of reviewers, and so I owe TP two debts now. How would you like them repaid?


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